Intervals
by newbluemoon
Summary: A depiction of the evolution of the twisted relationship between Batman and Joker. Warnings for the series: B/J slash, graphic sex, violence, torture and profanity. Disclaimers: Nothing belongs to me, s'all DC's baby. No profit is being made.
1. Disease

**Diclaimer: None of the characters or locations belong to me. Everything is DC's and WB's. Isn't it always?  
Warnings: Will eventually include: swearing, m/m, sex, violence and procrasination.**

Disease.

There was a city once, a place frost bitten in summer, where the bitter darkness was so thick it was merely _black _ and the children grew up on streets paved with human meat, and mothers would scold them for picking up an errant finger from the floor because _you don't know where it's been! _There was a city once, festering in decay in the back of the minds of the outside world. _Ignore it. It will go away. _They stopped paying attention years ago, turning their noses up at rape victims, kicking the beggars with steel toe boots. _Forget they exist_. Someone else will take care of it. There was a city once, falling, falling down, no-one leaving trails where they tried to claw their way back out. A city where no-one cared and the rivers oozed with grimy mucus. And it spread, out far into the rich green land, consuming the naïve blades of grass in a toxic bubble of inky smog, lined with the malicious, putrid vomit glow. There was a city once. And it was dying.

And yet there was a flow, a current underneath the rivers of trash and faeces and maggot-infested body parts. Something was building amongst rancid fumes, sucking in the consuming bacteria like the breath of a new day, _thriving _under the plague. A virus worming its way through the anguished cries, blowing babies away like paper dolls, coming and going, lurking in the intestine splattered alleys coated in bilious hues. Always silent.

Except for that _laugh._

When there's enough rabid filth, when even the roaches crawl away, of course it will sing out to the disease. Of course. And there aren't enough white... blood... cells in the place to take it down. The infected open sores drag them back down, blanketing them in heavy insanity. And when you wear the scourge and scum and every last vile, acidic, eroding parasitic piece of waste on your back, as a cloak, as a life line, the disease will inevitably follow you. _Forever. _To the edge of the living until it strikes you down, dragging you into its dank depths, never resting until you are _his_. And then it will multiply. Breed and move on. For a disease like that will never be curable, never be containable.

And yet, your only hope is to stop it from spreading.

**A/N: So in case that wasn't clear, this was all one huge, pretentious metaphor for Mr J. No offence, my dear clown! **

**Just to let all you guys who are reading this know, what I've done is set out a whole bunch of prompts for myself to stimulate the ol' writing juices so I can get cracking on my main fics. They'll probably be anywhere between 100 and 1000 words each in length, so they won't be substantial. Hope some of you get something out of them anyway.**


	2. Ringmaster

**Disclaimer: Still not mine. Still DC's and WB's. No surprises there, right? Unless you are really, really dumb. ;D Same warnings apply.**

Ringmaster

They tell me I'm a cockroach. The scummy remnants of natural selection. A wormy little flaw on their perfectly sculpted social structure. A piece of shit. An insane, twisted, deranged, evil, evil monster. A man. They build be up, stoking me with all these _de-light-ful _insults and then they try to tear me back down and spit on my name. They tell me I'm human.

_Well sticks and stones may break my bones but a shiv stuck in your posterior parietal cortex will send your scheming on a catnap._

The truth is, I'm a ringmaster.

I can conduct you with a finesse the dandiest of actors would sell their souls to insurance men for. The way your beady eyes stare at me, blinking with your enchanted look of _mundane, _it makes me want to do bad, bad things just to put a smile on your wretched visage. I know what you'll do. I could see it the second you stepped into my circus. You're so _predictable._

I was tired of you the second my _bea-utiful _gaze landed on your Bambi eyes, chubby cheeks and pink, pink flesh. So easy to rip. So easy to destroy. _But _I decided to uh, _spruce _you up a bit. Make it interesting. Make you playable. And then I cracked my whip like the delectable dominatrix I am and you jumped through the blazing circles I set out for you, you were running round and round, headless. Senseless. Blind. The fear in your eyes as I had you walk that tightrope glistened and sparkled until you weren't so boring anymore and the crowd went wild! They wanted to see you fall.

So I cut the rope. Snip, snip. SNAP.

And you fell and broke. Just like they all did. So expected. So..._prosaic. _But why do we fall and all that crap, right?

Soooo, I got a _new _toy, a new _instrument _for the show. A couple more performers to dangle over the lion's den. I told you, the crowd _loves it. _The peril, the excitement. Oh, they won't tell you that of course, but to see one of their own skating the brink of _annihilation, _oh boy, that _really _gets them going. See, they're no different. They _feed _off the danger. Fucking nourish themselves in it! When they see my little, ah, games on the TV or in the _ring, _you can bet your cotton socks they're jacking it. See, people are always scurrying around, looking for the next fleshy piece of drama to consume. They're the cockroaches, not me.

So, I'll keep directing them 'til the final show when the curtain comes crashing down to the ground in a blanket of guts and gore, hiding the stage from their squinty eyes, separating the _real _circus freaks the masters and the players. And the master players. And the doltish creatures still need to be told what to do. And someone's gotta do it, right? And who better to get this show on the road than a clown?

But as it turns out, the ,ah, _animal rights _guy doesn't like it too much when I make his precious monkeys do tricks for my amusement. He wants to steal my smile and shut the circus down. What a party pooper! He's always out there. Constantly picketing every show. But _really, _he's just attracting more _customers, _more game pieces, bringing _more _fun to this stalemate. I wonder if he knows the good job he's done for _business. _He's not dense. He _has _to know. And yet he still comes back for more. Every. Single. Day.

Between you and me, I think the animal rights guy wants to fuck me.

**A/N: I'm inclined to believe the clown! XD In case that wasn't enough of a hint, there be slash-a-coming in the near future. Danger, danger and all that. Reviews are the shit.**


	3. Father

**Summary****:** The third in a series of drabbles depicting the twisted relationship of Batman and Joker.  
**Rating**: Overall NC-17, this chapter pg-13 **Warnings For Series:** Graphic sex, swearing, violence, slash, procrastination  
Disclaimer: This is where a witty disclaimer asserting my lack of ownership over the contents of this work of fiction goes. It is also where it is stated that every in fact is under the possession of the cool cats over at DC and WB. Suing is a total dick move.  
**A/N:** Okay, so the prompt for this one is "Father" and it was suggested by a friend of mine. I wrote this ages ago and I kept putting off posting it because I wanna get to the slashy stuff, but it's-a-coming, I swear. ;D I can't seem to stop writing about Gotham in this series. I've always thought as the city as more of a presence, a secondary character almost, as opposed to merely a location. Idk why. I just love me some Gotham. XD I've got the next few chapters written and I'll post them once I've changed a few bits.

* * *

This is a world where heroes dress in kevlar, hide themselves behind brittle masks and shrink away into the darkness where they decided they would thrive instead of blinding themselves on the harsh glow of a paparazzi camera and smiling like they don't have to heave around the burdens of the city that gave birth to them. This is a world where men and women see the first glimpse of theatrics in a steady line of banal, mundane grey and instead of speculating on the norm, they seize the new life and lift themselves up our of the status quo and tower over the people they left behind like angry Gods waiting to smite. This is a world where villains aren't just on your tv screen awaiting capture or trial, they're outside your window, ploughing down your children, making leftovers of your white picket fence. This is a world where walking to your neighbour's house after five pm stopped being safe years ago.

And in this world your lives aren't sugar coated and bubble wrapped by public officials who don't think you could cope with _knowing. _No, men with ghoulish pumpkin faces and dusty clothing popped that uneasily calm shelter with a glistening, sharp,_very real, _pin before you even had time to prepare yourself for the sudden absence of oxygen. This is a world where the stormy air is lustful and insanity is a seductress, luring the innocents into its claws before closing on them and slicing them open wide, ripping entrails apart like a woman in a deleted scene from an Eli Roth film. Oh, and the people are positively _wanton. _It's not surprising madness can thrive so well here. There are rows of ladies, thirty-somethings, hair pulled tightly back off their prematurely ageing faces as they packed the lunches of their squalling offspring, clawing at their legs. And they don't recognise the face that stared back at them in the mirror. The girl who's life is not her own. They are swamped in the lives they have on loop and when a maddened cackled sledgehammers its way through the sanctuary of their perfect, immaculate cotton wool padded delusion, the part of them not screaming in abject terror is craving more and more and more. This is the kind of world the good people of Gotham live in. And it's all down to one man.

But the man who started this, the man who spilled the chemicals together and sat back to watch the inevitable explosion, isn't the criminal they cower away from in pungent horror. The nightmare he orchestrates is never truly his own. He is a catalyst in the hurtling cancer growing within the pustules of Gotham, certainly. He drives the insanity with a purple pitchforked trident, cracking a whip and watching his prey scurry about like lice as he swallows them all, lulling them into the false warmth of death. But this chaos , these tumours growing on this breeding ground of bacteria, will never be something he can carve his name into. Though he possesses these people, this madness is something he can _never _possess. For it was not born out of him. He was born out of it.

The true source of this pain, this unrelenting, agonising, wretched poison can not be attributed to a hoard of criminals. Nor can the fault lie with an orphaned childhood or a struggling elderly man desperate to understand and aid the fallen son he had been left with. The blame can not be cast even on a sole mugger sending bullets like shock waves through the stench ridden air on an icy evening. Because no matter what happened, what choices were made, what lives were taken, no matter what he had suffered, he would always have arrived at the point where his steady fingers gripped the ebony object with a righteousness reserved only for the _truly _insane. And out of that, out of this act branded with the mark of "good intentions", lathered in a balm of virtue, out of _this, _slithered the contaminated offspring, rising up in a silver storm over the sprawling skyscrapers, reaching up into the angry clouds as though they are trying to escape the plague on the ground. And it ignited instantly, bursting open, a pod choking on the delirium it contains. And all of it, every single last speck of derangement, of lunacy, of mania. Each and every disorder, neurosis and delusion defiling the face of this city. It was all anointed in the very second a sculpted cowl first sheathed a handsome face, blanketing it like a winding sheet. The minute he pounced off a building, the decaying walls of sanity, desperate to keep out the contamination and quivering under its might, deteriorated and crumbled. In apprehending the weak, he spurred on a tidal wave of oblivion and failed to notice. In becoming a symbol, the madness he inspired was inevitable, even if not intentional.

The man with the scarred face knows this and it sends him spiralling into a cavern where all that exists in the hilarity of this delicious irony. And he screams at the man, positively _screeches _at him to understand that he can bring his steel fists down onto the clown's etched face and body a million, a billion times and it will not _matter. _Because this, every ounce of filth the man in black is trying to fight off was never about _him, _it never came from _him. _Because _Batsy.._.

This world, this infection, came from _you. _Our Father.

* * *

Does that make B/J incestuous? *thinks about it*...Fuck it, it's still hot. XD Like I said the slashy goodness will arrive in due course. I should probably tell you that this series is going to be missing chunks of time out of it because it's more of a snapshots idea. Like, I'm only aiming to capture little moments in time, so there won't be detailed and slow character development but the changes will be obvious as each "interval" is posted and time progresses. Or ,ya know, at least I _hope _it will be. ;D Also: FFFUUUUUUCK. I accidentally deleted the sequel I wrote for "In Flight Entertainment" off my pen drive and I don't have a copy of it so I've fucking lost all the fic. D I guess I'll rewrite it eventually, but I just do not have the time to write it all again right now and I probably won't until after my exams in June. :\ Sorry guys.


	4. Mind

**Summary:** The fourth in a series of drabbles depicting the twisted relationship of Batman and Joker**  
Warnings For Series:** Graphic sex, swearing, violence, slash, procrastination. **Chapter warning: **Dream sequence including torture. It's not too bad though, imo. The torture scene starts and ends after the second and third respectively set of asterisks if you want to skip it.  
**Disclaimer:** There's more chance of Megan Fox agreeing to go on a date with me than this ever belonging to me, so we can safely assume nothing is mine. DC, WB et al are the lucky pimps of these boys. They're just unwittingly whoring them out to me.  
**A/N:** This is written in first person from Bruce's pov and acts in part like a s.o.c and in others a recollection of events. I'm not sure how I faired with this, so concrit is welcome. This is also a little longer than the other instalments. So it can't really be considered as a drabble. :\ Sorrryyy. This was written at 5:20 am when I was partially high and I haven't looked over it since, so uh...expect mistakes.

* * *

Each day it's just a little harder to open my eyes. It takes a little more energy to not let sleep take me over me until I'm eternally wrapped in its cool grip. The days are longer and I feel like I'm slipping. The night is growing every second, building and possessing. I fear I'm in danger of becoming consumed.

And yet I can't stop.

Not even Alfred can help me in this. I have to carry this burden, this weight, because no one else can. No one else _will_. It is solely my task. I knew this when I took on this mantle, this legend and when I first wore a cowl instead of a uniform as I did it, I knew the consequences. What I have created, I knew I would pay for. And yet as I stand up and my eyes fall upon the plagued land below me, watching intently as _no-one _cares for the slippery shreds of life this town is clinging to, my heart sinks into itself. I am truly alone in this stagnant city.

Except, of course, for him.

Sometimes when I fight him, my crooked enemy, I wonder, does he strive to see me crumble?To see me give in? And then there's that malignant gleam to his poison eyes penetrating my own gaze and I remember of course he does. He's a snake, injecting slow-acting venom into my veins at each contact, waiting in the undergrowth as it courses through my blood stream, meandering throughout my body. Destroying my senses. Pulling me under. Until every _spark _melts away, dissolves, under the weight of the toxins and then he pounces. Striking me down. Swallowing me whole.

I'm not sure if I can stop this. I'm not sure if I can find the antidote in time.

And I'm not sure I entirely want to.

* * *

The other night, I dreamt I was standing in a pitch black, rusty storage container standing close to a medical table. In strange clips like flickering film reels, I saw a man strapped down to the hard surface with barbed wire bonds, his mouth covered with a piece of bile yellow cloth. A tie. It did not silence his whimpers and sobs, only muffled them. In my dream world, the insistent whine merely irritated me.

The room reeked with a slaughter house odour, the stench of blood and innards and faeces overwhelming. My dream self did not mind. I felt, in my hand, a cold, solid object. From its length and weight I understood it was a knife of sorts. My other hand came 'round to caress the edge lightly. Yes. The smooth, deadly point confirmed my theory. I did not question why I was holding this weapon. It felt _good _in my grasp.

I felt myself moving closer towards my companion. My legs did not feel heavy as they do in my waking hours. I felt light, like I was floating. I felt free. When I was near enough, I squinted through the darkness at the man's features. His cheeks were swollen and wet. His eyes reddened and small from what looked to be a lengthy onslaught of tears. There was a large gash underneath his thinning hair and rust trails down his substantially large forehead. The blood was dry and flaky indicating that the man had been in the room for a long while. This explained the smell of urine and excrement as well as his slender appearance. I carefully examined the hills and valleys of his terrified visage. I did not recognise this man. Never before had I seen him. It did not matter.

There wasn't a single thought within my mind to help him, to cut the wires digging deeply into his filthy skin and holding him down on the table like a deranged puppeteer. My normal instincts to save and protect were not in existence here. I couldn't call them up if I wanted. My hand tightened on the sharp tool in my possession. I brought it up to my chest and carefully fingered it's length. [1] The man's eyes widened as they fell upon the knife I held and he began to struggle fruitlessly for the barbs were digging into his flesh, indenting his chest and letting crimson bubbles slither out. My cheek twitched with an early spasm of a smile.

He shouted and screeched against the material covering his mouth as I brought the cool metal down against his shirtless chest, stroking it with the dangerous weapon as one might caress a lover. It was to taunt. The man, about thirty eight I decided, begged me with his tear saturated doe eyes as his torso was shaking with each sob polluted breath. In my dream, I wanted to laugh at his futile efforts. This was how it was always going to be. You can't change this outcome, dear. _There's no going back. _I pulled away from him, lowering the knife. He blinked and held his breath.

And then I was attacking him, my knife sliding easily into his body as though it was no tougher than congealed soup. His inhuman cries of pain and fear made their way past the tie and brought a grin to my face. The way the pointed blade pierced into him sent waves of joy throughout my form. It was almost as though each time crimson flowed from a newly formed wound, I was purging the world, or at least this reality, of another rabid parasite. Like this was a worthy cause. I pushed the metal under his skin and moved the edge of the knife upwards as though I was peeling a carrot or a potato. [2] The noises should have been sickening. The sounds coming from his mouth should have been enough to make me vomit, but not even the squelching of his skin, meat and muscle coming apart from his bones could turn my stomach. My blood was buzzing. I felt a haze engulf my body, tickling pleasantly against me. This was like a lover's warm embrace. I pulled off the hanging, sliced chunks of human and, on a whim, shoved a piece into his ear. Absently I etched the name of my favourite actor into his stomach for no other reason than I felt the desire to do so. My gaze followed the way the silver of the knife could indent the skin, slicing it effortlessly, drawing, and then little paths of life fluid would follow after my doodles like the trails left in the clouds in the wake of a jet plane.

I moved lower down the table, dragging my tool down the length of his body as I went. My breath was calm, my pulse steady. I knew what I was doing. I reached for a side table I did not notice before hand and carefully placed my knife down and selected what what appeared to be a clip point blade with a serrated edge. I couldn't quite tell in the murky darkness. For reasons now unfathomable to me, I brought down the instrument to the man's foot which I held with a firm hand. Executing a series of movements with my lower arm, my intention was to saw off each of my company's bare toes. The task took a little less time than I would imagine, the dermis and tissue melting away like candle wax under the constant gnawing of my knife. The ivory bones jutted out like tusks from the fleshy stumps I left after each tiny limb popped off and fell hard to the floor somewhere beneath my feet. My victim's eyes were fluttering closed and his whimpers becoming quiet. I assume he was passing out from the blood loss and the shock of this violent episode. Well if he wasn't planning on using his eyes again...

I reached for my first knife and grabbed the back of his head as I slowly inserted the tip of the stained blade underneath his lower eye lid, digging into the back of the spherical organ. He jolted up again, only serving to send the knife deeper into its destination. _Well that woke him up. _My dream self felt elated with glee as his shrill, desperate cries sounded out through the dark room once more. I bent the blade upwards, attempting to force the eyeball out of it's socket, watching as it slowly and comically became disconnected from the man's face, the skin surrounding his eye lid breaking and cracking like the soil during an earthquake. It was a little tougher than I anticipated and my companion did not sound grateful for my efforts to hurry it along. Finally it popped out with a wet sound and dangled down onto the man's cheek, connected by ugly veins and rectus muscles, the inferior oblique having almost completely snapped during the extraction. The dream version of me wondered if he could see further down his face now and soft chuckles made my chest vibrate. With amusement, I picked up the eye and pulled the straggly strings of muscle linking it to my victim's head tight before slicing them in one quick motion and throwing the eye over my shoulder.

I peered at the cavity that had appeared in my friend's skull. My fingers itched for something more. Something to fill the hole I had created. And just like a dream, hammer space provided me with the familiar, jet black shape of a batarang. My eyes rested on it and I heard a laugh I could not recognise as my own bounce off the walls as I brought my weapon of choice up to my lips, ready to pervert something greater than myself in what I knew I was going to do with the instrument I had created to fight the scourge of the city. Acting on the impulse that had seized me the entire length of this nightmare, I brought my arm up and with Batman's strength, I sent the bat-shaped blade slamming down into the dying man's eye. I felt it hit a wall of thin bone I recognised from my studies of transorbital lobotomy. The man was positively howling now in what I imagine to be indescribable, terrific agony as he lay trapped in a limbo between life and death. Whirling around, feeling almost giddy as I bounced back to the table, I picked up a small mallet feeling like Thor as I danced back over to my friend's side. I was muttering things to him, the last sounds he'd ever hear and my fingers tickled along his cheekbones soothingly.

I asked him with a raspy voice for his last words, which he neglected to give me. I found this rude at the time. I felt my senses become finely tuned and acute as I looked upon the face of the man I was about to end and swung up the mallet higher than my own head. And then it was tearing down through the air, colliding with the edge of the batarang, knocking it deeper into the male's skull, finally perforating the layer of bone and swiftly embedding it into his brain tissue. I revelled in the way I could feel my instrument ripping off chunks of flesh as it slid further in. The sensation sent me riding out halfway to Nirvana. I had taken a life. Nothing had ever felt this glorious. I was untouchable. I was a God. I looked up.

A window had appeared on the wall and outside, cutting through the darkness like only a flame can, Gotham was burning, fire swallowing my city as my symbol stood erect and sticking out of a dead man's eye socket. The laughter was getting louder and louder and the walls around me in this dream land started to drip with the dark colour of human organ blood. I clutched my hair with entrail coated hands, bending over, the uproarious, howling giggles aching my stomach as the skyline of my beautiful, cursed Gotham crumbled into dust.

* * *

When I woke shivering and undoubtedly pale, I couldn't look at myself in the mirror. My guts felt cramped and I knew I had been laughing in my sleep. The graphicness of what had just played out seized my digestive system. The _detail..._Nausea gripped me in its unforgiving claws. I bent over the sink and spat out every last wave of bile and vomit that boiled out from deep within my grieved body. The next time I saw the Joker, I couldn't make my gaze meet his vile, poison eyes. I felt as though he knew every last thing I had dreamt of and though I told myself a dream is merely a dream, there was a voice inside my head reminding me of the Freudian and Psychedelic sects of psychology.

I ignored it.

It's not the only voice occupying my head these days. And since this nightmare, they have only gotten worse. Especially_ his_ voice. It's always there, bitter and mocking. Reciting things to me recognisable to all in possession of sanity as sheer madness. But on and on he goes, blabbering about my inevitable downfall, making sure I know how hard I'm going to land, how he'll take me downdowndown. And I want to scream and shout and claw at the invisible walls containing me in this hell I've created for myself. And then he'll remind me of the way out. The exit always open to me, the door leading to a path of peace. The one that if I take, he'll be right and we'll both be gone from this world. Both of us lost to the final battle. All that will remain is the reality of my nightmare.

It's not an option.

And then he laughs that deluded, shrieking cackle, echoing the one that fell from my dream lips, and mocks me further. What worries me the most is how accurate my subconscious' grasp on the Joker is. How easily it is able to take on his form. I feel myself begin to question my dismissals of his views on the two of us, and then wonder if this wasn't his intentions all along. To see me cave in on myself like a black hole.

And then once again, _but of course it is._

I do not know why I question these things. He has made his notions and ideologies all too clear. I know what he truly desires. Because the monsters and voices inside of my head are nothing compared to monster _outside _of it. And it's that creature that wants me to warp and transform into his carbon copy. Wants me to see things his way. To have someone on his _team. _I cannot let this man devour me like this.

The days are getting harder and longer. I have no drive left to allow my hands to slap on the panels of my armour. I am alone. This is all true. But I cannot give up. I cannot let myself become him. I cannot lose my _mind _to him. I will fight that outcome with every single breath I own, Joker.

You will _not _win.

* * *

[1] Be honest, your thoughts went _there _didn't they?

[2]This was actually a little nod to the oss corrots of yesteryear and _that _potato fic.

**So the Bruce in his dream in his shadow which "is a part of the unconscious mind consisting of repressed weaknesses, shortcomings, and instincts. It is one of the three most recognizable archetypes, the others being the anima and animus and the persona. 'Everyone carries a shadow and the lesss it is embodied in the individual's conscious life, the blacker and denser it is.' It may be (in part) one's link to more primitive animal instincts, which are superseded during early childhood by the conscious mind." (wiki**) **It makes me wonder what Joker's shadow is like. Maybe it embodies someone similar to Batman**.

**I might edit bits of this in the next few days. I want more gore. The only reason I stopped was because this damn thing was getting to long or a "drabble". What is wrong with me? When I go to write oneshots they end up like 10,000 words and when I go to write drabbles they're 2000 words. DX Ah well. Oh and another thing, I may start to mess around with time in this. Like, the future installments might not go linearly. I'll try to make it clear as I un-confusing as I can, but I figure I should warn you guys. Also- PSSSSSTTT. DUDES! GUESS WHAT? SLASH IS COMING NEXT CHAPTER BABY. ;D **


	5. Taste

**Summary:** The fifth in a series of drabbles depicting the twisted relationship of Batman and Joker.  
**Warnings For Series**: Graphic sex, swearing, violence, slash, procrastinating  
**Disclaimer: **NAHZING EES MINE. EVERYZING EES DC'S UND WB'S.  
**A/N:** Alright guys so I finally got to the slash. Nothing too graphic. Boo I'm a whore. I know. But hopefully it's a step forward. This one was based on a prompt I randomly selected. It screamed slash, right? ;) I wasn't going to post this one just yet, but I know you all want the b/j action because let's be honest, that's what we're all here for, right? *sighs* You fanboys and girls; I have you all sussed out. ;D Okay I'll admit it, it was my eagerness to hurry it along. What? I'm in need of gay, god dammit. XD

* * *

The first time it happened, it wasn't shocking or surprising. There was no grand debate on morality, no second guessing. It wasn't some horrific revelation like you'd expect. It was merely the next level in an eternally mutual struggle. When you let go of a rock, it is destined to fall to the floor and when two halves meet and their jagged edges slide into each other [1] in an acidic battle with more might than a dozen Persian armies, it was inevitable that they would arrive at this point.

A battlefield meeting off snarling lips. Blood, teeth,fury. Passion. Not a thing is twisted or removed from normality. Nothing had changed beyond recognition. The battle raged on, the two of them locked onto their enemy, hands still clawing with savage brutality as they forced each other up against the charcoaled walls of a lost shipping yard. The death rattle of the burning building in front of them erupted through their eerily quiet soundings as it succumbed to its end and sank down into the ashed earth, collapsing like everything, in the end, must. And then the air became spiked with silence as though the rest of the world was stopping, their blank eyes falling onto the pair, adopting the visage of one looking into a black hole. Awe inspiring. Maddening. Deadly.

Neither of them noticed.

They were too consumed in the other, too lost in the way the biting kisses had adopted a rhythmic quality about them, like they'd been doing it their whole lives. The rough, marred cheeks of the painted maniac felt no more foreign against Bruce's exposed, stubble speckled skin than his own armour felt around his carefully crafted body. The violence they found in this joining of mouths danced along in tandem with their insatiable urge to connect bodily with the other, their hunger for physical contact finally manifesting in the gnawing of yellowed fangs, the mashing of puckered flesh, the brawling of baneful tongues.

Thunder tore open the frenzied sky as the Joker slammed his counterpart hard against the wall, grunting and gnashing like a wild animal. Bleached lightning followed immediately, gutting the atmosphere with a lethal incision, casting an A-bomb bright light through the night. The wind conjured up a train of trash, swirling it around their bodies, tightly pressed together, moving against the man close to them in a way one would associate with practitioners of the martial arts, certainly not lovers sharing a first kiss. This wasn't romance. This was anger and hate and lust puking out a spoiled brand of intimacy. Corroded, oxidised metal gates clanged simultaneously with another roar of mercurial thunder and the wind crying out into a city where no-one answered because no one was listening but the two men making battle with tongue and teeth and to them, it was all a symphony perfected by their own private orchestra. It was as though the elements themselves were taking notice of the most sickeningly ineludible bond ever to play out being shared under the tumultuous skies. Joker thought there should have been fireworks, explosions and rapid gunfire let off in the background as though this was the birth of Thor, the second coming of Jesus, the Titanomachy between the Elder Gods and the Olympians, a clash between Vishnu and Shiva. But he'd settle for the growling mouth of his warm enemy, the pounding tattoo emitting from his armoured chest and that interesting way he moved his perfect lips.

Bruce wasn't thinking of anything beyond the taste of the Joker's mouth. The rest of the universe had become utterly disconnected to them. This struggle, this distorted, bastardised form of combat was the only thing in existence. And it swarmed his senses, devouring every slither of self that he possessed each and every time the maniac's blood would spill into his hungry mouth, always followed by a pugnacious slippery muscle moving along his gums just _so..._

And he'd force his own tongue right back at him, not caring about the hard wall he was being pressed into, not wary of the savage teeth ravaging him. He just needed more. Needed to win. He sought out the peculiar combination of tastes within the cavern that was sucking out his soul.

The flavour, just like the man himself, was confusing. Unique. Everything clashed and collided, nothing quite making sense. At first he noticed the tang of the chemicals contained in his vermilion red lip paint, and the way his nostrils flared as it hit the back of his contracting throat was almost enough to make him want to pull back. As if that was possible. Then the first taste of the bitter, metallic ambrosia touched his taste buds followed with something that faintly reminded him of gingerbread. It was like drinking from the devil's cup, he knew this somewhere in his withered mind, he knew. But he needed more. It pierced his blood cells like a billion tiny hypodermic needles injecting him with a solution that could only be defined as absolute. And it was more addictive than the crack he'd never accepted at high society balls. The Joker gasped into his mouth as he began to grind up against him, shoving his head closer to his own and sucking at that aggressive tongue. He wondered what_ he_ tasted like to his arch foe. Nothing had passed his mouth for days, save for mints, but the way the Joker was meeting his motions actively and desperately told him there was something more. _The taste of victory._ As he ran his tongue over the bumpy surface of scar tissue on the Joker's lower lip, he thought momentarily that he could taste ash and embers and decay and he was certain he was experiencing the flavour of death. Something told him that this would be the taste of the man he'd never be able to forget. Something no amount of teeth brushing or gargling with store bought mouthwash could eradicate from the guilty corners of his mangled mind.

It wasn't until the twenty eighth time he had kissed the Joker that he stopped trying to rid that taste from his mouth. The way the thoughts kept him up in the brief moments he allowed himself rest as he woke up dripping with salty sweat revealed to him how much he hopelessly _craved_ the flavour. These episodes felt a lot like withdrawal. He let them pass.

And the thirty fifth time they connected in this manner, inside the back of an armoured vehicle destined for Arkham, he realised that he had long ago started to associate this taste- the embodiment of chaos and bane- with his idea of home. And for the first time kissing the Joker was no longer another stage in their war. It wasn't about power, domination or _winning._ It wasn't just another after taste left on his palate or something to keep him wide awake when he knew he by all rights should be sleeping. In that instant, something had shattered. Realisation sank it's venomous fangs into a fluttering vital organ somewhere deep inside Bruce and instantly he knew that it was all just..._different_.

Now, it _meant _something.

In seconds he had ripped his mouth away and kicked his way out of the van, leaving nothing in his wake but the distant echo of knowing laughter swiping at his eardrums.

[1] That sounds way more sexual than is appropriate for this paragraph.

**Slash! \O/ Now all we need is the porn, and we're good to go. ;D One track mind, man, I swear. I have the next few chapters written so I'll post them in the next few days depending on how much time I have. Thanks to everyone has reviewed so far, you guys are awesome for putting up with me and my procrasination. XD This is the first series I've ever written so I always figured it would get abandonned after the first chapter or so, but I actually look like I'm going to stick with it this time. That's either good or absolutey fucking terrible news for you guys. XD It's gonna go back to same old same old for the next few chapters but I promise the sexings are coming. When do I ever write anything without sex, huh? It's a fucking requirment/sickness. ;D**

**Thanks for reading and for any reviews. I really appreciate it, dudes.**


	6. Insomnia

**Summary**: The sixth in a series of drabbles depicting the twisted relationship of Batman and Joker.  
**Warnings For Series:** Graphic sex, swearing, violence, slash, procrastination  
**Disclaimer**:Je n'ai pas le copyright pour ces gars. Ils sont la propriété des salopes heureuses à DC. Revising for my French exam and writing fic at the same time. \O/ But yeah, not mine.  
**A/N:** Ironically, I wrote this at gone six am when I was yet again unable to sleep. I'm hoping for once my sleep deprivation will work in my favour. This is mostly based on my own experiences with the splendid condition I blabber on about in this story. It's different for everyone, but I wanted these guys to suffer as I do, because I'm a cruel, sadistic asshole. ;)

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Bruce used to sleep fairly well. Or at least he'd sleep solidly. When you get home every morning after five it's difficult to not be dead to the world until you're godforsaken alarm pierces the comfort of your slumber after a mere two hours and you're forced to get up and sit in a meeting with men who sneer at you when they think you're not looking. Of course, this always was an opportunity to sneak in a few more minutes like a school boy as soon as Lucius' back was turned. But not any more.

Now he wass lucky to even get an hour. Even after a night of agonising pain and ruthless effort to rid the streets of vermin, he cannot force himself to pass out. His mind wass constantly active, working over time to process the rapid fire changes in his life. Sometimes he felt like his mind was resisting unconsciousness to avoid more intense nightmares because the weeks after the last one saw him in hell. Or in this case, some dingy, derelict apartment in the heart of the narrows where he'd collapsed under the pressure and hit his head on a rotten water pipe, ensuring that he was lost to the world for an entire day.

Mostly, he knew his mind was simply too busy to allow itself to rest. It had so much to think over. So many little details to ingest and puke back up. The rise to becoming a symbol itself had almost taken its toll on Bruce's strained good health, pushing him through trials he signed up for in blood. Warping his humanity, twisting it and shredding it like ancient snake skin until all that was left was a carved out hero where a man once stood. This had almost been enough to drive him insane. But at least he could _sleep_ back then.

When the Joker made his entrance into Bruce's fragmented life, surrounded by the ghostly smoggy aura of lost innocent lives, the remaining ash of a hospital and the stench of brimstone, that's when Bruce knew sleep would become a lot more scarce. And, of course, it did. To rest one's head when a relentless maniac frolics around your castle is both a death wish and made of pure crystalline stupidity. If the madman had escaped Arkham, Bruce would be out patrolling on silent rooftops or in front of a harsh computer, scouring every document in existence for just a _little _more information before bedtime. And then when the Joker was safely tucked away in his cotton wool cell and all was quiet and normal for a few weeks, the vigilante would feel his blood pump icy cold because it definitely _wasn't _normal. So he'd take to the streets, hauling up any poor soul who happened upon him and snarling at them for information on what the Joker was up to. Because he doesn't just _stay _in the asylum. He doesn't _behave. _And it drives Bruce absolutely, incredibly round the twist because he cannot rest nor eat and _won't _sleep until he knows because it's simply inevitable that the second he turns his back or closes his eyes, a portion of his world will be engulfed in a blinding white hot flame as the Joker crawls out from the pit keeping him restrained.

And then, of course, there was that kiss. It was not a peculiar reaction at the time. It felt quizzically right. _He _felt right, in all his putrid, nidorous corruption, rough and spasmodic against Bruce's body. But looking back on it, reflecting on the seriousness of the crime, the sin, he had committed, he hated every selfish, impulsive cell of his treacherous body, cursing himself all the while knowing it was going to happen again and again. And when he finally felt himself drop off the cliff into the shallow slumber his body craved, the images behind his eyelids had him snapping like an elastic band right back into the waking world. It happened every time. The memories a little too pronounced. Depraved fantasies a little _too_ heated. And the self loathing would kick in with the force of an ecstasy pill gone bad. He couldn't face this. Not even if his sobbing health cried for the break. He didn't desire this kind of sleep. Didn't want to plunge into _that. _

But surviving on little more than six hours of sleep a week is not an easy feat by anyone's standards.

There was a constant crackle and ringing in his ears like the hue and cry of a signal-less TV station, barking out its high pitched orders in case they lose their important, important profits. Everything felt warm and numb no matter how many polar raw showers he took. His skin tingled in the way your arm would if you leant on it for too long except it's all over, covering his body in a prickly, strained haze. Everything was so _numb_ sometimes, and other times, everything was so much more pronounced_. _Or maybe his senses were playing tricks on him. He felt drunk, and maybe he was. But always sober. _Oh so_ sober.

The models and socialites began to ask of his health, their scrutinising, probing eyeballs analysing the gaunt look his face was slowly adopting, the dark circles under his reddened eyes that not even a dazzling smile can distract from. He was changing, and gradually he started on the broken glass path upwards to becoming thin, loosing his body mass when his muscles did not have the chance to recover from his strenuous exertions, no time to repair. And they inevitably would begin to disappear. Just like Bruce felt he was. The gossip rags were speculating about a cocaine problem. Bruce wished it was something so trivial.

The medical side of things would soon start to seize him. He could already tell the difference in his reactions. His attention span had withered faster than a post-coital erection and he was quickly adopting the skilled co-ordination of a twenty-year alcoholic. Batman was none too pleased with this development in Bruce's personality. It was compromising. Dangerous. He'd have to tackle the issue eventually. Right after he discovered just what the Joker thinks he's doing playing around with one _Jonny Frost. _He would sleep. He would. If he could just figure this out...

Bruce looked with stinging, veiny eyes across from his desk at the digital clock he keeps next to the small bed in the bunker and sighed, tasting bitter morning in his mouth, despite never having left the night. He had to be up in seven minutes.

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Joker didn't remember ever having been asleep. Sure, he had blackouts every now and then, even what the dandy staff at Arkham called "microsleeps". It's was not important. He figured when his brain shuts down for brief moments, it was merely protesting against the infernal mundane sting of the never ending "same old, same old" of the living world. Even his subconscious wanted to avoid this reality. So he never really did mind these little..._lapses_. They only lasted a few minutes anyway.

But see, the Joker wasn't an _insomniac. _He could've gone to sleep at the drop of a top hat if he wanted to. But he didn't. Never, never. Because that would be resting. Sitting still. Allowing things to progress. Without him. And that would never do. The world needed a person like him to be there, always present. Like an omniscient force watching over the little pipsqueaks as they scurry around, heckling each other and attempting to survive another day in their shiny, shiny perfect lives. The very idea they could do all this and not have a moment of intervention from the clown was just ridiculous. So he had to wait and watch, forever awake because he was forever needed. To share the joke. To make 'em laugh. Comedy and irony never sleep. Why should he?

Truth is, he just could not abide the notion of the Bat being awake without him. At first it was easy. Bat's are nocturnal. Well, wasn't he a lucky ducky? So are clowns! But then he felt the niggling teeth of questions biting into his mind. What did the Bat do in the day time? Surely his plastic-faced alter ego- and of course he _knew, _don't be so absurd- didn't spend the days napping. And he'd sit around his dusty apartment of the day or inside a rusty warehouse of sorts, every curving thought illuminated like an acid trip of what, where, why. All Batman, all the time. It wasn't a case of obsession or drive, it was life. Simple as that. He didn't question it, and neither should you. He just needed to be there, up and at 'em. The pencil-shard headaches were pushed to the side. The nausea and memory loss didn't matter- he never had much use for memory anyway. The hallucinations were irrelevant. The double vision...well that was kind of neat, actually. But he could brush it all off. Absolutely all of it. Because the only real thing of importance was his Batsy, and he wouldn't miss a second of him.

If he had to have some cheap brand of insomnia forced upon his permanent record to do so, he could do that. It was all for Batman.

Everything was for Batman.

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**Don't worry guys, I'm sure you'll sleep perfectly well when you, ahem, sleep together. ;D **

**So this was based on the concept of them unknowingly giving each other insomnia due to their mutual obsession. Because of course, how can their brains rest enough for slumber when they're always tick-tocking away with thoughts of the other? Oh, by the way, this is set at some point after their first kiss. Not as late as the end of the last chapter.  
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**I have a short announcement; I'm going on hiatus for the next few weeks. Basically what that means is that I won't be updating/reading/reviewing until my exams are over because otherwise I'm failing _badly _this year. I'm actually on hiatus now but I figured I could upload this chapter as I had a spare few minutes. I've written 3 ½ more chapters of this, but I can't upload them yet, so bear with me. I _will _read and review everyone's work as soon as I'm back, but I just don't have the time right now.**

**Hope you stick around though, because I'm no where near done with this baby. ;D Thanks guys. **


	7. Fury

**Summary: The seventh in a series of drabbles depicting the twisted relationship of Batman and Joker. Rating: Overall NC-17, this chapter pg-13 Warnings For Series: Graphic sex, swearing, violence, slash, procrastination**  
**Disclaimer: When zombies finally take over the earth and massacre every living being on the planet apart from me (because I've already got my zombie-defeating plan figured out), I will sneak into DC HQ and steal the rights to all things Batman. And even then the zombies will probably want to fight me for them. But until that fateful day comes, all of this belongs to the none-zombified people at DC and not me. Cretins.  
That's all the boring crap out of the way. Now on with zee show...**

Fury

Despite what people may say about me, I'm absolutely, completely and one hundred percent cool headed. I don't subscribe to all those pesky little emotions you're harbouring in that crusty cage of a chest of yours. Don't let things like anger and rage cloud my vision. My definition of getting _mad,_ is a little different to yours. It involves loosing your mind, not your temper. But contrary to all this, I'm quite well acquainted with fury. I seem to have a knack for drawing it out of people. Oh most of the time it's laced with a nice spray of fear, a little hint of desperation and a good old fashioned pants wetting, but from one man it's always unpolluted. If I'm going to evoke that pretty, pretty emotion for _him, _it is never, _ever _escorted out of his body by any other feeling, regardless of the situation. When I do something a little too Joker-ish, and sometimes when I've done nothing at all, polar white flames spike in his cobalt eyes and he becomes possessed with the rage that constantly bubbles in his wiry, copper veins. Oh he becomes so completely _furious. _And it's so easy. It never takes much, as always, just a _push. _

I only have to taunt him with pet names and a teasing flavour in my voice to see those gorgeous orbs of his ignite like a dynamite derby. Only have to threaten to let some precious little infants meet a grizzly end in a fireball somewhere and he's shaking with the need to spill my blood. Occasionally, I don't need to do anything but party my lips and grin, letting my scars stretch an inch, two, and he's hurtling towards me, gauntlets ready to mar my flesh. He aches to discolour my skin in charming plum bruises and watch as death seeps out in my life fluids. He wants to rip me apart, peel my skin, wants to see my meat exposed to him. No, not _that, _you pervert. Although that's a theory I happen to have invested in as well...But I digress. The point is, he's always prepared to hurt me, to feel that delicious hate for me. I don't need to provoke it from him. The snake charms itself. His will power protecting that emotion from me is doily-sturdy. He wants to feel it and he wants _me_ to draw it from him.

The one thing that really, ah, gets him going, is a name drop here, a 'Rachel' there. Oh,the look in his eyes when I do that! I can taste his hatred swimming in the air each and every time. The murderous intentions screeching like trapped animals to escape the restrictions he's made for himself. I'm trying to pick the lock on those rusty chains of his, but Batsy must be a fan of bondage, cause it's a tough combination. These knots ain't giving yet, but they're fraying. Slowly, just like a virus creature-crawling away in your pumping arteries, slowly they're coming undone for me. With every new stab of wrath, of hate, of tumultuous fury, they're slipping. It may take a while, year, decades even, but when his hand squeezes my neck a little too tight, a heartbeat too long, it will be worth it. To see him crumble in my death, it will be the ultimate. So I'll keep trying it all, every last thing to see him captivated by an onslaught of abhorrent, vicious acrimony, because I want them to haul my carcass out of the cesspool river and for Batman's name to be carved into my rotting flesh.

But there's something that has me awfully stumped. Something I cannot for the life of me figure out. See, I did something a little...shall we say, _unusual _in another endeavour to conjure lethal, odious ire from my Bat, and it should have worked. I calculated the odds of him pummelling me into oblivion in the aftermath, and they were quite favourable. You see, a few weeks back, I kissed him. Lips on lips. Breath tangling with breath. Hell, I even slipped him some tongue. And I was expecting it to turn into yet another glorious Joker-beating session but it...evolved somehow. Didn't feel like a game. It felt _normal, _ I guess. But still, I was anticipating the beautiful bat-fury to come crashing down around me, like icicle daggers falling from the bitter sky._ Any second now..._ But it never came. And when it dawned on me that he wasn't kicking the crap out of me, he was kissing me _back, _I realised maybe this wasn't the most well thought out idea I'd ever had. Or at least, maybe it had diverted itself from my original intentions. You see, his tongue was stroking mine and I could still taste his hatred, but it was different. It was on another level. Compared to before, it was a parallel universe- mostly the same, but a little...off. Kissing Batman is like kissing the embodiment of fervid, zealous disdain. Needless to say I revelled in it, but afterwards, I couldn't help but feel that it might be just a little harder to drag out that familiar rancor from my darling and have it manifest itself in its fiercely typical form from then on. But I've never been one for normality, and I can't say I'm completely _furious_ with the notion. In fact, this change of events has me rather excited. I think you and I both know what's coming my way. It may even be better than sucking in my last breath as a kevlar fist closes in an ironclad contract on my pulsing heart. And I'm sure I can get that same fist to close on my...ahem. Now, now gentle reader, there are ladies present. But he will. And soon too. Batsy has a particularly inventive flavour of repression that I'm more than willing to taste.

Oh my, I'm just a lucky, lucky clown aren't I?

**A/N: You are indeed, my dear boy. This was a prompt given to me by a friend of mine who selected it at random from a prompt table. Not too happy with this chapter, but ah well. I need Joker pov practise anyway and oh my, was that the fourth wall I hear breaking in this thing? Hahaa. And if this wasn't obvious, I'm bacccckkkk. :D My hiatus was cut short by medical intervention so I will be reading and reviewing all the wonderful fic that you guys have left for me in my absence. :D I also have more time to devote to this crap and I've got up to chapter 12 written, so you can expect a bunch of updates in the near future. :) Reviews make me happy.**


	8. Criminal

**Summary: The eighth in a series of short stories depicting the twisted relationship of Batman and Joker.**  
**Rating: Overall NC-17, this chapter pg13. Warnings For Series: Graphic sex, swearing, violence, slash, procrastination**  
**Disclaimer: As much I would love to have "Owner of Batman and Joker" written on my CV, I do not. This shit ain't mine, yo. ****Except for Vince- he's mine. Don't really want him though- I'll swap you him for Batman and Joker. :D :D No? Fine, you bitch.**

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To shed one's skin and slither into a shiny-shiny, fresh new life is amongst that special brand of experience that would tear open the very fabric of your understanding and piss all over the foaming, puss drenched, infected sores found within. The way the body struggles against the change like an arctic wind and twists into the razor blade field of the unfamiliar is nothing one could consider pleasant for even the moments seized at the peak of a lycanthropic, frothing haze. But for Bruce Wayne, this entire process was becoming excruciatingly familiar.

Ever since he'd been torn from the protective womb of childhood innocence as the life fluid of his parents wormed its way out of their cooling barren shells in tendrils and pooled at his fallen knees, there'd been no end to it. He'd continually evolved, never settling at one stage, always clawing his way out of the sanctuary of his old cocoon and spiralling into the bitter blackness of the new. He believed with a religious man's conviction that finally his status as vigilante saw him ripened and regenerated to the pinnacle of himself. But reality soon tired of humouring the hopeless young man and thrust him into the thunderous cavern of change time and time again. He couldn't remain solid, not even as Batman. Not even this was something constant, a permanent state of being.

And so here he was.

Leaning against a sodden wall which whispered the secrets of insanity, mental decay crawling like noxious tentacles amongst the rot and mildew. The air was dust and blood, the small room overflowing with the taste of razor tension. The plaster flecks and the cracks on the defiled windows gave way to the boredom fidgeting in the clouds outside, grey coating the skies and all the beady eyes in the hellish container weren't even distracted from the remorseless mundane by his presence. The flavour was heavy with uncertainty on his tongue. He was used to all eyes on him; as young Master Wayne; orphaned child heir, as Ducard's golden boy-in-training, as Bruce Wayne; back-from-the-dead, billionaire playboy. As Batman.

But here he stood, unnoticed. He had adopted the visage and exterior of another once again. Shrouding himself in untruths so as to blend in perfectly with the unknowing prey surrounding him. On his head he wore a fine wig in the grungiest style his well polished mind could've conceived. Dirty blond, greased dreads fell past his chest in serpent-like coils, his gaze peered through the plastic green-grey of high end contact lenses and he'd long since buried his smooth, perfectly exfoliated, tanned face under the prickly fuzz of a sparse beard on pale, worn skin. His clothes held no hint of a lifestyle that attracted models and blood desperate reporters, they were simple garments; a cheap, untailored black suit and a plain burgundy shirt at least one size too big for him courtesy of a local Walmart. Still, the clothing felt cooler and less like a cage on his flesh than his usual custom made or just of the catwalk attire and it did the job just fine. If anyone asked, his name was Dale Beck, he was twenty seven years old, spoke with a southern drawl and hailed from downtown Central City (1) and as of three weeks ago, he worked for the Gotham mob.

The disguise was flimsy, one dimensional. It was perfect for walking among this brand of criminal- the disposable lacky. It had worked unconditionally well with nearly every loathsome man he had met, no-one suspected anything, not a single soul questioned his credentials, there hadn't even been a sideways glance at him. But there was one man who didn't fall into place as easily as the rest of the half-witted, gun toting army of the mob. Who always held the cold shimmer of unconvinced scepticism in his twitchy, untrusting eyes. The first time Bruce's gaze fell onto him, blood tumbled down his veins with Niagra force, retreating in abstract fear as he sucked in the image of a man he'd sliced open, ripped apart and laughed at standing in front of him with a dollar store bought smile and a firm handshake. He remembered sinking a knife into that leathered skin that his own hand gripped, remembered ripping the organ currently sizing him up out of its very socket without a second thought. Remembered the sickly high he felt as the man's heart beat dulled and silenced. Confronted with the image of this man once again, his guts squirmed. He was the man from his nightmare world. The man his dream self had tortured until the soothing cradle of death had led him away. His name was Vince.

Bruce came to learn words rarely left that stubble peppered, thin lipped mouth but when they did they were cemented with an air of consummate equanimity and fortitude; his tone never wavering, his voice never cracking and all the while his stony, unremitting presence engulfed the empty space around Bruce wherever he went. It was as though he was eternally watching the undercover vigilante, waiting alert for any sudden movement. The fact he never uttered anything more than sharp commands or biting snarls of disagreement only complimented Bruce's rumbling unease. But the playboy couldn't let himself get distracted; he was there with a mission. While sieving through Gotham's grime as Batman he'd heard whispers of the fledgling plans of the mob to attempt to seize control over the banks once more but the corners and edges were vague, no-one willing to vomit out anything substantial for fear of what the desperate mob may do to them. So the only solution was to take the appearance of another formulaic crook and poison the scab from the inside. The process battered his principles and quarrelled with his patience, but he'd ventured too deep into this cavern to let an apparition from an ageing night terror rob him of the result he desired.

But the ghosts of his subconscious wouldn't let him rest. Each and every time the shadows of Vince's gym built form fell over him, he'd feel the faint echoes of his dream, the blackness in him craving that outlet. And days shrivelled and wilted under the power of night and as they passed the meandering thoughts and urges he held somewhere in his grey matter only intensified. He'd see the man he was beginning to associate with some toxic mixture of pain and wonder move from place to place, carrying out heinous acts under the instruction of a mechanic crime faction. He'd watch unable to intervene as the silent man turned throbbing brains into slippery pulp, caused rib cages to retreat and shrink in on the precious organs they were protecting just with a few swift kicks of a steal capped boot. And Bruce's fists would curl and shake, his lips pressing thin together to restrain the roar threatening to pierce the fermenting quiet and those questions and desires whispered sweet nothings in his ear and begged of him "what if?" By the time he stood under the sallow bleach of a street light and watched in obscure numbness as a vindictive steel death warrant from the nightmare man's gun burrowed its way into the frontal lobe of a six year old girl unfortunate enough to have a rival mob boss for a mother, he was battling every slice of his snarling mind. The images of his dream weren't mere prickles and fragments any longer, they were frenzied fantasies gnarling out at him to yield and relent to the wishes of his pumping blood, to avenge and protect and do everything he needs to do, _should _do but never could for his own selfish reasons- and then his thoughts would cut off in strained muteness to prevent acknowledgement that these words sounded a little too close to _His. _

But he never really was able to halt the murmuring voice that hummed in his head telling him that maybe if he'd acted when there was time, if he'd let his dream self stab his way into reality, there'd be one less forgotten puddle of innocent vital fluid smeared across the side walk and one less bastard strolling smugly away.

Choking down this onslaught of blackened duty was draining him of every Eastern "mind over matter" technique he'd sucked from the mind of a corrupt leader but it had held out and taken him to this point as he stood in that rot ridden, long-since deserted repository waiting as the more senior mob bosses greeted each other and made their way inside the facility. Bruce found himself pondering on the reasons the criminal elite always seemed to stick to dingy, abandoned and seemingly inconspicuous establishments to hold their little meetings in. As Batman, they were always the primary places he'd scope out each night.

Bruce's faux green eyes flickered upwards as the metal door groaned open and in came the rest of Gotham's mafia, fronted by a wheelchair bound Salvatore Maroni. The mobsters slid into the room and constructed a circle in the centre, conspiratorial eyes everywhere. There was an uncomfortable, frosty silence as the criminals surveyed the surroundings and each other before deeming everything satisfying. Maroni's face held the same smug smirk of self assurance of the idiotic that he'd always worn despite his current predicament. Bruce recalled the buzzing of satisfaction in his flesh when he'd finally wiped that expression of the Italian's face upon dropping him from a building. Distant thoughts of the pleasing crunch of the mobster's bones sent a microscopic twitch of the lips to the billionaire's mouth before they abruptly fell back into a straight line lest he actually acknowledge the cleansing sensation that action had caused.

"Gentlemen, it's good to see you all." the calm voice of Maroni started, eradicating the silence, "We all know why we're here and what's on the menu for tonight. The cops and the politicians have finally decided to grow a pair, decided they don't care for our..._management _system no more..."

The words flowed away and merged together in one endless sting of nothing to Bruce as he blocked out the sound of yet _another _lengthy mob introduction. These people never got straight to the point. Instead, his eyes zoomed in on his co-worker who was squinting with suspicion towards the rear door. Bruce's senses immediately went on edge, waiting for the oncoming action as he'd soon learnt that as gut twistingly unnerving and as vile as Vince was, he had a strong eye for spotting disturbances. He slid his eyes back over to the in-progress meeting, wondering if anyone else had noticed anything.

"So I say it's about time we did something about this" Salvatore's voice continued to drone on, evoking Neanderthal cheers from the other men in the room. "Do any of you have anything you'd like to bring to the tab-" The violent, inevitable sound of glass fleeing its rigid form and scattering interrupted the Italian as savagely burning missiles were launched through the windows, hastily alighting the rotting wood and casting copper flames about the room. The startled men began shooting blindly just as human targets bombarded the area. Bruce searched amongst the blaze, seeking to identify the rival gang and as an almighty shower of bullets began to rain from the ceiling, he caught a glimpse of one of the others' face as it became illuminated in the acidic fire light. He felt his innards clench at the sight. A clown mask.

Adrenaline, dread and excitement raced through his body as his thoughts clashed like white, forked lightning in the sky.

_Not now not now not now. What took you so long. Why are you here!_

He didn't have the time nor opportunity to sink completely into the age-old obsession as just as his body was beginning to lock into that place it went to whenever thoughts of _him _emerged, he heard the deep, thunderous voice of his subconscious' plaything calling him.

"Beck!" Vince snarled through his hand covered mouth, attracting Bruce's attention and gesturing in a commando-like manner for Bruce to follow him as he cantered towards the side door. Instinct seizing the reigns, he quickly ducked through the smoke and bullet saturated air and swiftly made his way after the older man. As they entered the typically sub zero air, Bruce sucked in as much oxygen into his fume coated lungs as their capacity would allow. The thug, still glaring at Bruce, hissed at him to be quiet as he tossed him a 9mm glock and disappeared around a corner. The undercover man swallowed hard to rid himself of the build up of thick saliva in his throat and pushed the shivers attempting to take over his body away. Holding the very solid, very _real _firearm in his bare hands while standing in a dark alleyway conjured up images in his spoiled psyche he never wanted to confront. But he saw a provocative flash of deep purple at the corner of his eyes and damned his fears to hell as he bolted after Vince in the direction of something finally meaningful in all those weeks of sustained falseness.

He slipped around the corner and entered a steam filled, maggot breeding parking lot, Vince lingering a few feet ahead of him, gun raised, scanning the night for any sign of what they both knew was lurking in the inviting shadows that Bruce ached to sink himself into. He walked backwards to Vince, covering all angles of attack as he did so. He felt so much closer to the ebullient electricity he'd been rationed on than he had in all those accursed weeks. He'd spent so long craving the pleasantly numbing feeling of sheathing himself in kevlar and begging for the raging, rich titillation of his battles but he'd closed off those emotions and now he was so unexpectedly exposed to them, they tore through his being and encapsulated him in a blinding fury. It was glorious.

The black of the twilight seemed more limiting than it usually did, preventing Bruce from seeing completely into its murky depths and causing his heart to work with a little more urgency as he examined the night. He was getting ready to move on from this particular area, deciding that there was a possibility that the person he was looking for had taken no interest in what appeared to be two run of the mill brutes and had melted into the darkness and away from the burning effigy of the building. He turned around to voice his suggestion to Vince and felt the impact of the potent image of the gangster raising a semi automatic and aiming for the forehead of the gleeful embodiment of bedlam and freedom that was his arch enemy.

Something inside Bruce's soul snapped, the boundaries and rules rupturing deep with in him. All that was around him halted, everything adopting a crisp, well defined aura. He could hear the clamorous uproar of the ravenous waves in the distance, the pleading, shameless begs of gulls. He could smell every detail of the eternally present odour of piquant bile corrupting the fume polluted air. He could see, in such great quality, the crawling manner in which Vince's large finger prepared to squeeze down on the trigger.

And as that sight spasmed in unfathomable speed through his mind, something primordial gripped him with uncompromising savagery and with not a moment's reconsideration, he fired two shots of his own weapon right at the nightmare man who fell to the floor, clutching his bullet-mangled hand to the leaking wound on his hip. Wide eyed, Bruce felt his hand loose control of all muscle ability as the gun fell to the gravel with a dull thud. A singular promise declared to the heavens more than twenty years ago lay in smithereens. He stared at Joker whose forest eyes shone with a sunlight brilliance as though he was looking upon some retched miracle and Bruce saw the very instant in which those eyes grew large in understanding as they flickered all over his face, drinking in the details. Realising.

_So this is where you've been hiding?_

He heard the wondering question in his mind, the ruby lips not moving but they both understood the query. He opened his mouth to either splutter on an excuse he'd yet to think of or finally let himself speak the truth for once when he heard the unmistakable, cruel sound of a gun click. He edged his head around to meet his gaze with the hard one of the injured man who lay on the floor, pain contorting his face, pointing that damnable weapon once more, this time at Bruce.

"I knew you couldn't be trusted" the gave voice spat, "I should've finished your pansy ass off the minute I set eyes on y-" The threats, the closing monologue, everything that should have come was drowned out by the resonant drilling of a dozen bullets being emptied into Vince's balding skull. Russet ooze and chunks of organ splattered on the ground in front of him that was more than used to human entrails and the fresh corpse caved in on itself as it fell flat. Bruce just stared. He met Joker's blazing eyes as they thundered with the hideously destructive possessiveness he knew his own visage mirrored mere seconds before. The stare was too intense and he retreated to the solace of the less soul destroying sight of the seeping remains. His eyes drowsy and stinging with tension, his mouth dry and his blood boiling. He took in the sight of the body before him, the lifeless, breathless sack of meat, so much like it had been in his dreams. A lot less ravaged, but the empty glaze of the eyes he'd tried to avoid so many times was the same. And again, because of him, _again _this man was dead. He'd shot a man. Twice. To save the _Joker. _He'd betrayed the city, he'd betrayed Batman. He'd betrayed his parents...no, he'd pissed all over their graves. In a few seconds he'd sunk further into decadence than he had during all these years struggling against the secret wants and easy roads he'd harboured.

He felt his walls begin to tumble down, emotions he didn't even know the name of seizing his heart, his knees vibrating just getting ready to give in and then-

There were warm, tempting lips on the back of his neck, a firm body pressed up against him, undeniably real breath caressing his skin. He closed his eyes, just for a moment, letting this tangible stepping stone to reality sooth his worries.

"You didn't break, you know"Joker hissed into his ear, the tone accompanied with the faint whispers of nervousness, as though he could sense Bruce's mental turmoil. "He's dead. Because of _me." _He brought his daring arms around Bruce's torso knowing if his Batman was in any other state than this, he'd risk some form of injury at such an..._intimate _gesture, but it was all too obvious on some unspoken level to both of them that Bruce somewhat _needed _to feel the Joker right now. Needed to have that balance proven to him. Joker brushed his head against Bruce's in what could feasibly have resembled an affectionate nuzzle.

"I'm not _ready _for you to break yet," he whispered softly into the horribly false blond hair his foe was sporting.

Bruce allowed himself to be absorbed into the moment for a little while, finding he liked the pleasant way in which Joker's sturdy chest expanded and shrank behind him, reminding him he was alive, _he_ was still as constant as always. The faux green-grey eyes didn't move from the cooling carcass, basking in the way his senses were shutting down to the abominable picture painted before him, noting how a small part of his person found the situation heinously palatable. Once he'd had chance to re-evaluate the proceedings, he'd embrace his gluttony for self punishment and destroy all Joker's carefully constructed pep talking in a few heart wrenching sobs and bitterly angry, feral roars, but that could wait until he got home.

Leaning back into Joker, he breathed in his scent once more, bringing his hand up to squeeze the one resting on his breast bone in a silent recognition, though not a condoning, of the fact the madman had saved his life tonight.

"You need to go now" he murmured in a voice caught somewhere between Bruce Wayne's and Batman's, though there was no venomous hostility breaching the tone for once. He felt the exhale of an exasperated sigh on his neck but noticed with wry amusement that Joker took it as another opportunity to kiss his neck, marred lips lingering on his pulse point as if savouring the taste before pulling back abruptly and after the few short scuffling noises of padding footsteps, Bruce was once again alone.

The body on the floor was not as horrific as the worryingly graphic, maimed shell that the frays of his sleeping mind had concocted but it was so much more peculiar to see it solid and in reaching distance. He looked at the two holes he'd been the cause of; the ragged flesh of the burst hand and the deep, gaping wound on Vince's side. He looked at the mess that was once been a brain leaking from something that faintly resembled a skull. He looked into the dead eyes of the odious, vindictive, primate of a man he hated so fiercely with such an unidentifiable passion. And there was no regret. He'd never admit this again, not even to himself, but he in that exact second could say with complete and utter crippling honesty that there was not a single atom inside him that was tainted with contrition. Well, except...

Casting his burning stare into the vapid orbs of the frigid soul, he only wished that, as long as he was stealing scenes from his nightmares, there was in fact one of his own personally branded weapons embedded in the dead one's eye socket.

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**(1) I'm going off the assumption prevalent in the 90s that Central City is located in Missouri, though near Kansas.**

******Alrighty I finally got around to posting this. xD it's been in storage for literally ****__****months ********because, well, because I'm too lazy to actually post things. :p I wanted to get across in this that there are, ahem, intervals in which Bruce's 'shadow self' bleed into reality, though he wouldn't let himself go all that far. As much as I love dark!Bruce (and oh god, I do) I doubt he'll be out so much in this particular fic, although there are a few more appearances from a little more amoral Bruce along the way. ;) I didn't want to have that slushy bit at the end, but it wouldn't let me not write it. I had to send Joker away before it descended into a full blown love fest and I can't have that. ...Yet. Speaking of, porn is arriving after the next chapter. **

******These probably can't be considered 'drabbles' anymore, given the 4000+ word length of this one so I should probably change that, huh? o_O Oops. Also ff. net has deleted practically all my formatting in all my stories. -_- I'll fix them when I have time.  
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******Sorry for the wait with this you guys, but if anyone has actually stuck around to read it, I'd love to get your opinions. :) I'll be updating this more regularly from now on too.**

******Oh and by the way, Godell's ****__****amazing ********fic The Games We Play has finished. D: D: I know, I know but you guys seriously need to check out that ending because it's just WOW. GO SEE.**

******Also I never thought I'd have to say this but guys, please don't plagiarise my work. I've had someone in the past few days literally copy and paste chunks of my fic and claim it as their own and it's really disheartening. I mean, we as authors put a lot of work into our writing and to see it stolen just makes you feel like "oh what's the point?" I know the large majority of you wouldn't do that, but just as a warning, please do not do it. It's ridic. I mean out of all the writing you could copy why the hell would you choose mine? It's mediocre at best. Knock that shit off man.**


	9. Accident

**Summary: The ninth in a series of drabbles depicting the twisted relationship of Batman and Joker.**** Rating: Overall NC-17, this chapter: pg**  
**Warnings For Series: Graphic sex, swearing, violence, slash, procrastination**** Disclaimer: If it wasn't clear by now, I own none of this. Ya hear me? NONE OF IT. Bite me.**

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They had been fighting, the same old usual Armageddon inducing rage and boiling adrenaline whisking in a tumultuous avalanche, enabling the warring vessels to once again blanket themselves in cool denial and welcoming ignorance. It was uneasily close to the point where this was customary- the necessary battles and wounds used as shields to block out unforgiving realities, such is the comfort of the devil you know. To slice and bite and roar and cackle was to deform and disguise impulses to touch and hold, the quick, fluttering urges the man shrouded in dusk spat at and the freer of the two clawed at with enraged need. If they couldn't fall into the sharp caress of equivocating tongues, if they couldn't hide from this disfigured violent truth, then perhaps they could at least justify the cold flames with enough rusted, ferruginous liquid shed from bruised bodies and exposed maw.

So they had forced themselves into a carbon clash of pugnacious, sparring limbs, breathing raggedly, inhuman brutality spiking their blood flow as the heat of struggle consumed them, scratched at their weary resistance, pulling them an inch closer to the cavern they tight roped across.

Attacks hailed down with a mechanical unpredictability, the unholy bonding of the passions of hatred and tepid unwillingness biting in the breeze as the soulless night hissed commands of duty and fulfilment. The two were nothing if not slaves to destiny and it just so happened that theirs was to seek out the marrow of the other and wear it as a champion would a tiger hide all the while clutching onto silent, snaking dreams of merely holding a writhing heart. And born out of these snowball desires were the after moments. The reasons, if they actually allowed freedom of thought, that willed them to maintain their roles with such feverish devotion. Wet flesh moulding in butterfly seconds, slippery muscles feeling so deliciously fated for the one place they had absolutely no right to ever exist in. Occasional cupping of twitching jaws, the dangerous brushing of deft fingers on a glowing, disgustingly beautiful face, the hummingbird quiver of a heartbeat felt through thick armour, telling them the other had survived their encounter to find their core pumping for a whole separate reason. And the fates would allow the ravenous predictions of coveted moments as long as they served to sustain the everlasting conflict between the assumed titles of good and evil.

Their contrasting eyes shone with a united gleam, holding the combination to the daring hopes of the other, blazing green calling out to the crystalline cobalt, sucking the distance out of the air between them, inviting the other to loose himself in the heated collision of their bodies as they struck each other, forgetting themselves as inner monologues took over, neither their heads nor hearts in battle. Bodies shut down and instead moved in a timeless autopiloted routine as craving thoughts waited with potent impatience for what comes next. And as they allowed the razor talons to perforate and drag them away, neither noticed the luring danger as they inadvertently danced backwards towards the starving edge of a wallowing building. Knowledge of the tears in Batman's cape seeped from their pounding brains as the hero and villain pounced on each other in eager, halfway acted venom. The Joker rolled them over and shining blades aimed with a stunted accuracy as he avoided vital areas of the man beneath him before strong arms propelled him backwards in an almighty rush of strength, causing the clown to trip and stumble as the vigilante righted himself, persistently unaware of how close he was to the fall as every last one of his senses zoned in on the cackling genius picking himself off a grimy rooftop.

Crackling vibrancy tangled its way through the buzzing nervous system of the moss haired one as his mouth fell open in slack jawed glee, every ounce of his being adoring each passing second of contact with his partner. The instant his balance was reinstated, he propelled himself in a silk-strong glare of bruised cloth toward the heaving chest of the jaded knight, catching the hyperbolically tall man at an odd angle. The caped creature wobbled in an uncertain latitude and it was then their eyes ignited in paralysing dismay as the odious flaw was realised and frantic gloves swiped out a pulse too late, tragic fingers merely brushing where they needed to go, a loved and loathed body sinking foot after foot towards the esoterica of the onerous asphalt. The whip of time cracked through air particles, slicing the fabric of linearity as the lionised cloak withered under pressure and failed the Batman as he helplessly folded and crumpled to the base of the building, a perilous distance away from the frenetic thudding of the madman's heart. And the champion could only stare in fierce horror as the force of his being lay mangled in a wreck of twisted limbs and gashing head sores far below him. The great Batman, the Dark Knight. His all. Beaten and unconscious before the maniac entitled the Joker, precious breath undetectable even as the frenzied clown rushed his way down the building to the cowled one's side. And for once, it was all an accident.

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Surges of hyperactivity spasmed around Joker's insides as he paced with agitation up and down a drab apartment he'd forced his way into a few hours prior. The place was nothing special; grime coated démodé wallpaper slathered in gaudy styles, mismatched furniture yearning to be cleaned, typically creaky floorboards coated by a ragged coral mat in the middle. It was nauseatingly normal. The only notable features were the forms of a knifed young woman and a deceased physician as well as the foreboding image of an injured Batman laying bandaged on a bed he had no claim to. Having been conquered by an emotion that tasted queerly like abject fear upon almost killing off his playmate and spurred on by short blasts of energy, Joker had lugged the vigilante into the nearest ground floor apartment, disposing of its paling occupier as soon as he crossed the threshold. There had been no time to waste on appearances and showmanship- a knowledgeable knife slammed into an unsuspecting temple did the job as he struggled with the unconscious hero now held in the grips of serious peril. As soon as Joker had Bruce securely placed on the greasy bedcovers, he began viciously ripping apart the living quarters as the madman searched with utter peeling discomfort for some kind of first aid kit, hissing curses and commands to the fates with every passing second. By the time he located a small red box in the kitchen draw, his heart was firmly locked into his gullet. The idea that Batman might die at his hand in a lifeless flat was entirely inconceivable. The criminal swallowed thick agony, wincing at the alien taste. He would _not _let that happen.

That had been eight hours ago, the night long having melted under the glare of the sun, the Batman's heart still beating dully thanks to the doctor Joker had his henchmen bring to him. Dr Phillips had treated the damaged Bat through damp eyes, his hands shaking with heated terror as the electric eyes of the madman flared at him, the promise of certain death should he fail written all over them. But he had persisted with determined precision in his duty, his oath playing like a mantra in his mind. But after long minutes he realised there was no way to finish what he could do with his limited supplies without removing the cowl. His cracked voice trembled as he relayed the information to the anxious maniac, nerves alight at the appearance of very human fear on the monster's face. But to his absolute surprise, the man nodded his consent and with skilled hands, bypassed the shock system on the helmet and cautiously peeled back the mask. The older man tried not to gasp and stare at the young playboy's unconscious face but natural shock and curiosity cradled him as the gossiping mites in his brain began nattering away. A violent raspy voice sliced through his stupor with a bark to get on with it, so the good doctor pushed his feelings aside and proceeded to mend the wounds on the broken Bat's body.

The minutes were long and choking on nervousness as the physician examined his unwanted patient. The armour had taken most of the fall even without the aid of the cape, but the billionaire was still in need of a painful amount of stitches, plenty of rest and a boatload of drugs. Upon finishing his task, he turned to the clown and, still quivering under the roar of his green orbs, told him he could do no more for the Batman. The Joker would just have to wait and see. It was then that he was struck by the incongruous query of '_why does _he _even care?' _and before his imbecilic tongue could be stopped, his eyes grew dangerously wide as he heard himself asking the madman the very same question. All he saw before the world perished into crude blackness was the disgusted snarl of the clown and the end in the form of a gleaming knife.

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Bruce slit open his stinging eyes, the dull light of the daytime hidden behind drawn blinds but still extracting a hissed whine from the brunet as the brightness egged on his thundering headache. Once he could will his eyes to blink away the crusted sleep and open them fully, his eyebrows furrowed as he surveyed the room he was lay in, not recognising his surroundings at all. He racked his brain for memory of what had happened, left with only fleeting flashes of yet another battle on yet another roof top. Bruce pushed on his forearms, trying to sit up but harrowing pains pressed against his attempts, jolting and pounding inside his limbs, ripping his newborn quest to get up away from him.

Sighing, he dropped back down on the bed, noticing how heavy he felt. He was still in his armour. His heartbeat stopped for a moment as he realised cool, dusty air was brushing at his cheeks and forehead. Slowly, he brought a gloved hand up to touch where his cowl should've been, ignoring the blinding agony he was in, and when it came into contact with flesh not kevlar, he scrunched up his eyes in a combination of horror and defeat.

"It's okay. Nobody knows" a nasal, well acquainted voice murmured. He turned his head a little too fast for his condition, blood rushing in front of his eyes before parting, allowing him to peer at the form of the madman, leaning habitually against the door frame, the picture of languidness. But his face exposed immense stress, the bags under his eyes more noticeable even with all the black makeup, the forest orbs absent of their normal, maddeningly astute edge. Even his face looked more pale than Bruce was used to. It was...unnatural.

Bruce fought the urge to give into the role he was accustomed to and to snarl and rage at the maniac. He blinked, feeling exceptionally groggy and disorientated, his vision clinging onto the image of the clown so as to stabilise itself, evoking some semblance of balance as his body fought against his maladies. There was an inkling in his veins that Joker had _saved _him somehow. The specks of stinging knowledge that the maniac had done something, and if he _hadn't _Bruce wasn't sure if he would be here in this noname dive that he didn't even want to think about how Joker came into occupying. The madman in question began moving towards Bruce, appearing highly strung with some brand of tainted apprehension, the notion of course preposterous, but his body-language spoke volumes.

"The doc said you're gonna be feeling a little _off _for a few days. And you've broken a limb or five. But I guess that's what you get for jumping off rooftops. So no flapping around for a while, 'kay?" Ah, that's what happened. Bruce's memory returned ten fold; the scuffling with Joker, loosing his balance, the look of strained fear on that painted face as he made a grab for his hand. And then, nothing.

"The doc?" Bruce whispered, shaking off the remnants of what had happened. The purple clad man cleared his throat and pointed towards the slain remains of Doctor Phillips, a substantial supply of bodily fluids haloing the body. The playboy felt the icy nails of neat rage rake at the barriers something inside him had constructed, but whispers inside his skull sang to him that this was no shock. Still, he felt bubbling anger inside him, wishing he could get up and beat the viscera out of the murderer, but as it stood, he settled for sending him the most severe of glares his concussion would allow.

"Oh, don't look at me like that" Joker whined, rolling very tired eyeballs, "He had to take your pretty little cowl off. I couldn't let him live to sing about it." Everything knitted of justice that Bruce held inside him screeched at him that this was disgusting, sick and just wrong, but something very small chirped that, actually, Joker was right. The method of silencing was undoubtedly something he could never condone but as he looked at the bloody body that could've easily have been Mr Reese's, close to the foot of his bed, all he could think of was the insalubrious truth that of course Joker would kill to protect him. Of _course _he would save his life. The man was possessed with insalutary obsession, a kind he would never admit he had tasted himself.

The clown was now perched at the foot of the bed, his jade eyes charring, scorching right into Bruce's own. He looked almost angry, no hints of typical delight or amusement present in his entirety as he scowled at Bruce with such a rancidly strong expression, the vigilante had to struggle against the need to turn his head away. The painted man's hands twitched as though he wanted to touch, to _grab_, his body trembling, taken over by consuming, dominating emotions he was clearly not used to confronting. Just as Bruce was considering speaking to take the edge away, the madman swiped out a hand, and before the Batman had a second to flinch at the suspected attack, he was gripping the leather coated hand, squeezing impossibly tight, his eyes still digging into Bruce's tattered soul. He leaned forward slightly, his face hovering over the injured man's.

"_Never_ do that again" he hissed through gritted teeth, hand now practically crushing the other's in a way that was possibly very painful. But Bruce just couldn't tell. There was not one single thing about him that wasn't completely focused on Joker, swallowed by the severity of his gaze and the low command in his voice. The unspoken threats and ferocity thinly shielded the range of flaring sentiments behind his eyes and Bruce found himself nodding, helpless under that stare to do anything but agree with him. And he _knew. _Understood everything the green haired man was trying to inject into his body. In those moments he allowed his resolve to fade, his principles dying on the spot. Because this man had saved his life. Because he was here. Because in his pulsating core he knew very well he'd have done the same thing in little more than a flash. And he could play dumb and stick his fingers in his ears accompanied by a chorus of lalalala and tell himself it would be because it's the _right thing to do. _But it was an unsavoury flavour. The lies slithering into expiration for the time being and just for a few seconds he could acknowledge that, yes, a bond between was very much in existence. The surges of electricity flowing in his arms at the madman's touch were too potent not to notice. He swallowed. And squeezed back.

They stayed like that for several minutes, uncaring about the ridiculous image they created, the see-sawing emotions aligning themselves for precious few minutes, allowing them to remain is a tight limbo. Soon, the last of the shivers erupting in the criminal abated, his muscles taking on the calm, soothed exterior they generally held, drawing comfort in the motions of Bruce's fingers as they remained wrapped around his hand. The vigilante's eyes started to gradually droop despite his efforts to remain awake, not completely trusting the clown not to do anything. Saving his life was one thing, it was inevitable, but that in no way meant he wasn't going to _do _anything to him while he slept. Joker's brows knitted together at the sight. Bruce needed full medical attention to clarify he wasn't about to become enveloped in the clutches of death, and that wasn't something he could provide for his darling Bat right now. Letting go of Bruce's palm, he rouse from his place on the creaky bed and picked up a cellphone from the floor where he'd thrown it after speaking with one if his agitatingly inadequate goons. He watched the vigilante with careful eyes as he reluctantly handed the device to him, not wanting to leave his presence just yet.

"Call your butler. We're in 34b, Pine Street, Robbinsville." he muttered as Bruce took the phone. Bruce slightly inclined his head forward and began to dial with throbbing fingers, hoping Alfred's voice would unleash him from his stupor. Joker leant forward, pressing bitten lips against Bruce's hair, shivering upon finally coming into contact with something that wasn't designed to _prevent _contact. Bruce went rigid, fingers halting as they dialled and his breath hitching at the firmly uncharacteristic action. But somehow he didn't think that the innocent kiss was so out of place in this situation, but then, this situation was out of place with the rest of the natural order of things, so it was probably expected.

"No cops" Joker whispered against his chocolate locks, before gracefully pivoting away and striding towards the exit, stepping over the empty corpse on his way. As the door clicked shut, Bruce lay bewildered, clutching the phone to his chest, his thoughts stuck between chafing understanding and vigorous confusion. As he finished pressing the sequence of numbers, his mind swarmed with the desire to unravel the enigma of the brief moment he had just shared with the maniac. He went with the sensations of the minute smile tugging at his lips as he listened to the lulling rings of the phone and decided that, actually, being free from the cutting restraints of denial felt good. Even for this short passage of time, he felt _free. _

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**A/N: Okay guys, so that went a little angsty, huh? Not to fret, it won't continue like that. The schmoopy little bit at the end was unpredicted yet again. I dunno why I do this to myself, because I don't even want it there. Gah. But I basically wanted to have Bruce providing some kind of comfort for Joker just like the reverse we saw last chapter. Did it work? ::Shrugs:: Goddammit, I need to get a beta.**

**Next chapter is porn and it is basically JUST porn. xD Oh, like you guys mind. But heads up, it's not going to be a hate fuck thing, because I'm so tired of that plot line. It's so trite. That's not to say it's a fluffy thing either, because I'm tired of that too. It'll be...well, I guess you'll have to read it. XD But within the entirety of this fic, there probably _will _be chapters that include hate sex and chapters that include more fluffy sex, but that isn't my main goal here. I want to explore elements of mutual need, even if it's begrudgingly and reluctantly, for both parties at times. This is more about their desires to be with each other in any form and they'll sometimes hate it, sometimes understand it and sometimes sort of like it. You'll see as it unfolds. :P  
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**Also, I want to reiterate to you guys that these chapters are just short instances- this isn't a consecutive or linear story, so one chapter won't come right after the last and it won't necessarily be in order either. These are just the more distinct moments of their lives that I want to focus on. In between these chapters, they're still fighting as normal, kicking each other's ass, Batman's still sending Joker to Arkham, Joker's still escaping yadda yadda yadda. So yeah, there's no gradual character development here. You'll see rapid changes in their relationship with each chapter, but that's the point- to show how they change over time, not to show the actual change itself. Get it? No me either, but fuck it. That's what I'm doing. :P**

**As always, feedback is appreciated. Thanks guys**!


	10. Hang

**Rating****: **Overall NC-17, this chapter** Warning:** PORN, PORN SO MUCH PORN. D:**  
****Disclaimer: **If you elect me as owner of these two, I promise to include gay sex in every appearance of theirs. What do you say? NO? :O Well screw you then. (Apparently my campaigning isn't going well, so no, I don't own this. DC does.)

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The soothing torment of the velvet, aphotic night blanketed Bruce in its icy heat as he shuffled out of his inviolable box and into the sting of reality and the rotting carcass of verity. A hood, a flimsy, cloth hood, was all that shielded him from the mephitic, fetid sewage of his city, having already snaked out of his caged form. He took the cold comfort of his cowl for granted and it was times like this as Bruce stalked through the fermenting side streets and the churning tombs of alleys, capeless and unprotected, that the fact bellowed in his head, a torturous echo. The same hissing voice that hammered in all his mistakes, all his freshly decomposing ideals, every last fractured and bent rule he had promised to no-one. And it was even more pronounced at this moment, free of his costume, free of his role. Nothing distracting him from the clawing thoughts relaying themselves in their hunger to be heard and recognised by the deaf man. And it kept projecting the image of fulgurating emerald eyes cutting into his insides with lethal authority, penetrating every cell he owned, sending ripples and uncontrollable spasms into his core. The meaning and sense conveyed in those murky, ruminating orbs, the severe knowledge they possessed boiled him internally, eroding his grey matter with calculated bluntness.

It had been stalking him systematically in allotted time slots of hurtling hours for weeks that had been melting into each other for an immeasurable amount of time. And it had been building and spreading through him with bacillus determination, pestilence in his veins until the murderous crescendo forced him out of the door to meet with the diablerie cursing him. He did not have the privilege of knowing what his intentions were, _why _he was doing this and what it stood to achieve, but as much as he protested against the convulsing needs, he still found himself putting one foot in front of the other at a rushed pace, stalking to his destination.

The peccant air was balmy and freezing at the same time, the unsavoury paradox foreign to the sane, but was a close relative to the delusions that enjoyed patting Bruce's back whenever something was about to happen. Superstition was bile on Bruce's palate but the blushing, impatient skies coiling with the ashen remains of human bonfires, enlightened with the reflexivity of something preordained and coming together with remarkable wantonness time after time sat too heavy in Bruce's stomach for him to ignore. An omen, an inkling, a sign. Call it what you want but as all the elements sniped at him, as his senses boiled and his heart combusted in on itself, he knew something vicious and rewarding was going to happen that night. He'd been turning his head away from the merciful hints and clues all night long, but the magnetism in the coercive whip of the winds drew him forward and it all became heartwrenchingly impossible to deny. Repetitive grasshopper voices carnally giggled at him, and he was aware of their message as it looped numbly inside his blemished skull. The faint, distant scratching of the future at his timid, fabricated walls, wearing away at him like a parasite until he agreed to be sucked into the pit. And he felt queasy, his sculptured face bleaching yellow at the pounding knowledge he was going to fucking _dive _into it of his own happy accord. He wanted nothing more than to sing the lullaby of sugared outrage and accusation. Wanted the comfort of his future self becoming cocooned in the cotton wool of easy substance abuse, wished for the silken excuse of blackmail or self sacrifice in the marble name of Lady Justice. But as it stood, there wasn't a single external validation he could excrete from his gnawing mind. This was all him.

_He _hadput away the batsuit and left the shelter of his home, exposed and vulnerable in a war zone. _He _was hiking halfway across a incurable city to an area he only had a faint idea of. _He _was the one seeking out a poison with dizzying highs and lethal effects. His emotions, want, drive, need brought him to this point, tracking down and hunting his own downfall. But he couldn't stop, perversely he didn't _want _to. He wanted to stand at the cusp of a hungry death rock, he _had_ to follow these siren cries. He had to know if there was anything redeemable in what he was feeling. If these perverted swells of raw instinct meant their sweet promises. Had to give in to the chance of deciphering it all, stumbling across the uncompromising truths. This tide declared he could finally _know, _and he wasn't about to rob himself of that outcome. The endorphins rush licked his nausea, permitting it to surrender and he felt freshness of the filthy air fill his lungs, preparing him for the remainder of the night as the hollow fingers of darkness dragged him further into their clutches as he disappeared from the sallow neons, fully into the fire.

xxx

He found himself walking into a pleasant looking, if slightly musty, apartment building, barely blinking. Numbly allowing the magnetic hold lug him forward as he arrived at his destination. He walked the dimly lit hallway, his brown gaze drawn immediately to the door at his left, ajar and laced in citrine tape. He knew exactly where he was and it was this that had his heart fighting to escape his chest, his mouth dry and his eyes stinging. But still he stepped forward, climbing over the plastic barrier and entering the room where his life had been saved by a maniac.

He closed his eyes, breathing in the scent of the room, trying to ground himself in senses but it smelt of harsh chemicals and bitter metal, undoubtedly from the actions of the authorities' while clearing up after the Joker. A foul taste of disappointment registered on his pallet before he opened his eyes and surveyed the room he continued to venture into. The chalked outlines of the bodies were still present, little cards detailing inane facts at the side of them. The bed covers were still disturbed, just how he'd left them, though he had been careful not to leave behind any traces of body fluids or anything that could be traced back to bumbling, clueless Bruce Wayne. He reached out, trailing his fingers along the worn cotton of the sheets, soaking himself in memories. This wasn't his bed, or his flat- he'd merely used it while the owner lay lifeless, stewing in a pool of her own juices in the hallway. But...somehow he felt he needed to be here. Felt drawn to this horribly humdrum place.

He was hauled out of his thoughts by the distinct footfall behind him and the rustling of the crime scene tape. He didn't move. There was no point. His skin started to buzz with vibrant electricity, his muscles began to quiver in strained anticipation. He already knew who was approaching him. He felt the slow addition of heat into the room as the man in purple arrived at his side. Bruce peered at him out of the corner of his eyes, the flashes of white, green and red too tempting to fully ignore. Joker was staring at him, he realised, the forest orbs slicing with unique talent into his body, the gaze stabbing into him, impossible to ignore- just as it had been the last time they were in this room together. It was as though in that stare, Joker knew everything about him, knew the parasitic torment bubbling in his brain. Knew his hopeless, foolish dreams. Knew the salts of his consuming, viral needs. And he couldn't help but feel as though he wanted to unfold himself open, slice himself into clear cut pieces to show the man next to him everything that he was. In these interludes, Bruce felt himself become weak, powerless to evade the oncoming events, all the while embracing the growing sensations of strength dancing in his bloodstream, urging him onwards. And he turned to meet the insanity inducing glare of his enemy with his own blazing blue orbs, refusing to turn away this time. He wasn't backing down, not now. He met those blistering jaded eyes with a stare equally as intense, feeling himself sinking in towards the maniac, fleeting thoughts begging of him -_can you feel it too?_

Finally, Bruce was staring down the barrel of sober fate, a place inside of his chest aflame as pieces of him broke off and crumbled into eager dust. For the first time, he wasn't running away from this. He wasn't blanketing himself in deceptive guilt, he wasn't cushioned by duty. For once, he just _was._

And out of nowhere, the sacrificial pair thrust forward, ravenous hands grabbing for purchase at glowing skin, sliding over creased faces like they were starved of the sensation, lips colliding with desperate precision. Emotions leaked out in between sly breaths as, nimble, delirious fingers tangled themselves in brown and green locks, chests heaving as they realised the twist in the road they had passed onto. They were barrelling towards this outcome, nothing left to grab onto but the other, nothing to stop what was in motion. They were decaying into their counterpart, and they wanted to._ Wanted _it.

Both of them knew they were intoxicated, knew this wasn't rational or intelligent. Knew it was filthy, dirty _badbadbad. _But mouths parted in unrestrained passions, hands clawing and teeth gnashing as the agonizing stumped blaze of yearning poured down on them, and there was no remaining, splintering notion between the two of them that sang of giving a damn. This was unstoppable, uncontainable and they could feel themselves dissolving in it. As though they were melting and shifting, the universe around them fizzling out of existence, leaving only the two of them to remain grasping onto the life support machine of the man wrapped around their body. They grunted and snarled into biting lips, all the power and rage of the battle flaring up in feral passion as clothes fell with restraints to the stained carpet, abandon filleting the air. Bruce tore off the blood speckled vest, the clown having already disposed of his overcoats somewhere amidst their rabid kissing, and slid his hands under the violet shirt, tracing the muscular torso of his enemy as his tongue explored his ruined mouth. Joker jerked his head backwards, pausing their contact to lift the vigilante's sweater over his flushed, makeup smeared face, off his perfectly ruined body. He panted, desire like coal in his eyes as he looked upon the shattering image of the canvas map that was Bruce's upper body. He fought with wiggling impulses as forceful spasms snapped at him to pounce and claim, but the playboy reached forward, his softening expression cooling Joker's raging needs as a hand wrapped around his bicep, ushering him to return to the billionaire. Their mouths stood millimetres apart, tingling and reddened, their eyes heavy and charred as Joker shrugged off his own shirt and tugged at his tie, leaving him bare chested and quaking under these obnoxious, bloodthirsty desires.

Bruce pressed his lips against Joker's once more, humming into his mouth as the madman threaded his arms around his waist, pulling him flush against his body, the firmness of his chest, bare and touching his own skin, sending sparks of pure excitement through the billionaire's ravenous form. Bruce had kissed these lips dozens of times, and each time he had felt himself slipping into the corruption found coating the maniac's tongue, but this was different. The taste of the paint, the hot, naked flesh, the hands fluttering over his body, fingers daring to breach his waistband- it was unlike any moment he had shared with the clown. Normally, he'd feel his senses explode in his head, fizzling and burning until there was nothing, roasting away at his core. Devouring him. But here, everything was soaring, the sensations so immaculately untainted, every touch diluted with something he could only liken to life. This wasn't the usual numbing endeavour. This made every repose, every synaptic spasm, every goddamn second worth so much _more. _He wasn't questioning. Not now. His every reaction- physical and mental- was bellowing at him not to lose this to doubt. Not when it felt so-

Joker let go of a gasp he'd been threatening to crucify should it pass his lips as Bruce did away with thought processes and snaked his hands down to cup Joker's ass through his pants. He slid his tongue in delirium over its insistent counterpart invading his mouth, relishing in the waves of pleasure rolling off him as he merely kissed the deathly force wrapped around his body, uncaring of the consequences just for _once. _Bruce parted his legs, winding one around the pinstriped limb of the man he was relentlessly trying to consume with his mouth. He pulled on Joker's ass, and disposing of any lingering spitefully wise traces of caution, he began grinding the now pulsing bulge in his pants up against the the murderer's crotch which he found was now in a similar state of unsteady arousal.

Joker moaned in approval as Bruce rubbed against his encased cock, wanting nothing more for the final barriers between them to evaporate. His mind was completely lost to the debauched euphoria he was being lead astray by. Sex was never something that gnawed at his psyche, never something that occurred to him as an activity he might one day sample himself. The whole concept was hideously banal to him. So rancidly average. Human. But _Batman_ wasn't something he'd taken into consideration back then and it had been utterly laughable the first time he'd touched that previously unresponsive flesh while running thoughts of the Bat through his infested mind. He'd been crying with gut shredding hilarity as he finally hurtled over the edge of climax for the first time, but this...this wasn't funny. His Bat was moving against him, his arms around him, his pulsing arousal pressed against Joker's own- as lost to this connection as he was. And all he wanted was more. More of this friction, more contact because _fuck, _this is what he'd been saying for so long. Bruce groaned into his mouth, the noise echoing through Joker's body with volcanic instance and ruptured something inside him, dragging out a guttural sound and wrenching his eyes open. He wanted more of this. Right now.

Bruce's breath was sniped from him as he was shoved harshly back against the bed he'd recuperated in, his head hitting the pillow, sending the warmth found in zero gravity twitching inside him. His eyes lost focus, the grainy black replacing crisp images for a heartbeat before he felt the strong body straddle him, a demonic face hovering near his, curtained by a waterfall of green curls, black lust encrusted in every inch of that baneful expression. It was the look he was accustomed to when Joker was out for blood, warped with something stolen from their illicit relapses and it shot gorgeous, foreign fear into him, arousal curdling in his middle and he pulled Joker down to meet him, catching the sliced bottom lip within his teeth, eyes dusk and desire chasing demons around them. He felt rough hands grapple with his belt, wondering why the _hell _he'd thought wearing one would be of any use, his pulse causing riots in his head as the inviting lick of the cold air wormed its way into his pants, followed by those covetous fingers. Bruce's chest thudded when the cool digits brushed past his pulsating cock, almost deliberately ensuring the teasing contact was felt before the light caress of fingertips was withdrawn and with it, his pants and boxers, Joker tugging at them in feral want, grunting as they were caught on his ankles. The vigilante hoisted himself up, keen to escape this vulnerable state- this needed to be on equal footing. That meant Joker's pants had to go too.

He fumbled with the mismatched button on the purple trousers, frustration building as the impossible disks stubbornly clung onto their position, preventing full contact between them. The battle felt like it had spanned decades, but with a final snarl of impatience, tanned hands batted away Bruce's and instantly buttons were launched across the room and the bite of the zipper was heard. Hurriedly, the playboy yanked down the final article of clothing separating them, removing the clown's underwear at the same time, not even putting up his defences when a heated noise ice-picked its way out of his throat as Joker's cock bounced up against his own taut stomach, reddened and wet at the tip. His lungs were working over time, ballooning inside his chest as the pair took in the sight of each other, whole masses of humming skin exposed for famished eyes to suck in, the results of their mutual actions aggressively standing to attention. The look on each of their faces, dishevelled hair spanning out like tendrils over their eyes, not quite hiding the needy, wanton, smouldering gleams across rosy faces. The sight of their respective foe, open, nothing between them save for paint and sweat and looking utterly, licentiously sinful would have been enough to sustain their hunger for months. But they were greedy men and, really, this could never, _never _have been enough. They never crawled from the communal womb of the kind of person who did things by halves. They liked things to come full circle, to be whole. Complete.

Unable to even contemplate not touching now he'd gotten this far, Bruce fell backwards, pulling the madman on top of him, slicing his fingernails into Joker's back as he did so. The two groaned as their cocks finally met, demanding, throbbing and without restriction and the brunet slid his hands down to cup Joker's ass, caressing the bare, smooth cheeks, thrusting his hips up to intensify the contact between them. It was maddening- after all this time. It had been _years _since they had first met. Years of debauched longing and shredding self hatred and the solution had been in plain sight the entire time. The sensation of Joker's dick, his _flesh, _hot and slick, encasing his entire body, his form slotting so fucking perfectly against Bruce's. It was as though he'd spent his whole existence frozen. He could feel the blood howl and pound in the shaft rubbing against his and moaned deep in his throat, uncaring about the sight he must've made, spread open and drenched in need beneath his mortal enemy. He was openly writhing, bucking up against the psychopath, scratching his nails on that deliciously scarred skin, promising the spectres around him he'd trace every last one with a carnal tongue. Forest curls were flicked over a curved shoulder and the criminal brought his hand up to that dangerous mouth, his eyes not moving from Bruce's as a pink, crafty tongue darted out. It traced the palm of his hands in a tortuously slow, sensual path, ending at his finger tips, those emerald beacons slamming right into the flushed billionaire and _fuck _if that wasn't the most erotic sight Bruce had ever seen.

It took the vigilante a while to realise the low, needy almost-whine echoing around him was coming from his own mouth but a vicious grin peeled its way onto Joker's face and there was no mistaking that malice for anything else, as that now wet hand descended and cruelly danced along the length of his dick.

"_Fuck" _he gasped out the first word spoken between them that night, eyes clenching tight at that fluttering, barely-there touch. The smirk plastered on the madman's face evaporated back into that agonisingly lusty glower as he leant down, braced on one hand as he slid his parted slips over the pulse point in Bruce's twitching neck.

"Calm down, dearest" he whispered against the glistening skin, a helpless tongue fluttering out to taste the salt of the bronzed flesh. He experimentally wrapped his fist around the heat of Bruce's member, pumping just a little and soaking up every last beautiful moan escaping those fucking perfect lips, his entire body on the verge of collapsing when his Bat arched underneath him. Coming undone At his hand. _Heh, literally._

Bruce almost couldn't take it. Joker was hardly doing anything to him and already he could faintly feel the sizzling acid of the white hot daggers stabbing inside of him as orgasm built up in his balls. The mouth on his neck was driving him insane, the wet, slippery muscle tasting his skin in earnest, mouthing the sensitive flesh like he _knew _what it was doing to Bruce, licking against the thick, pulsing veins he found in the playboy's neck. The hand withdrew from his cock and his eyes flew open, glaring at the Joker because if he _dared _tease him now...

But then the jade eyes were twinkling up at him, hidden secrets locked in those hauntings orbs as the red mouth made way for a salacious tongue, gliding down his collarbone, a glimmering trail left in its wake. Bruce felt his breath pause, almost _hearing_ the tattoo of his throbbing erection, matching the hue and cry of his over excited bloodstream. He could feel the weight and warmth coming from Joker's own appendage as it rested on his thigh, he wanted to reach down and grab him, tear him apart under the throws of pleasure, inflicting every goddamn last second of pure fucking ecstasy on him with ferocious devotion until he warped and twisted under his fingers, exploding just for him. But for the life of him, he couldn't move. He was utterly paralysed under Joker's ministrations. Desperately wanting nothing more than to devour the clown before he himself was consumed, but finding it impossible to will his body into action. As though, should he remove himself from this position, the environment would wilt away. Ferment into nothingness just like all those torrid dreams, full of warped reflections of bliss and empty oaths.

But the mouth edging across his chest was too soft, too pliant to be something the bitter dredges of his psyche could've conjured up. The maniac had always droned on about how he knew Bruce better than his own self and he was shoved into the gaudy headlights of admittance because _yes yes yes_. His fractured mind could never retch up something so fucking perfect. Joker was pulling him apart, disintegrating him in this deadly perfection and he wanted happily to sink into it. The tongue slid across his nipple, teasing the sensitive nub with deft circular motions before sucking it into that ruined mouth. A strangled noise followed, Bruce's hands twisting in the sheets, not quite understanding how this was happening. How every last touch seemed to have the ability to push him a little closer to flowing over the gorge. Even as his nipple was taken between careful teeth, the soothing embrace of faint pain only served to make his cock tremble with miserable want. He felt the world quiver and vibrate but the hand ghosting over his chest and up to just under his jaw, casually stilling him told him that the source of the shaking was himself.

The torture was exquisite and a questionably large part of him didn't want it to end. Ever. But the other man seemed to take mercy on him, letting go of his erect nipple and trailing spider kisses down his naval, stopping briefly to dip his tongue into Bruce's belly button, causing a surprised wail to coax its way out of that tightening chest, before moving on, lapping at the ticklish flesh covering his public bone, rolling downwards with trickle-slow pace, lingering unreasonably long in places it had no need to. Bruce's teeth dug into his lips, tiny drops of coppery liquids leaking onto his taste buds as he felt warm breath finally tiptoe over his cock, moisture evident in the air. He forced his hips to remain still, fighting against every muscle that implored the stubborn man to just give in and buck up into that devilish mouth. But no. He stayed remarkably stiff, face contorted in arduous anticipation as he felt the Joker's warmth so close to him, and sickeningly nowhere near where he needed him.

He felt Joker's lips graze the area around the base of his dick, pressing delicate, satin kisses to the skin there, the tip of the now familiar scheming tongue just whispering at his flesh. His breath was short, adrenaline threading him with havoc as he felt that slippery organ wind down his lower regions, the areas it had slid from burning white. He was calling up all strength in his body, the power that had gone into hiding somewhere in his chest and was all but begging his arm to move, to push the clown's head where he want it and just as he thought he was making progress, a terrible mouth latched onto his sac, bombarding him with instantaneous agonising pleasure. He yelped loudly at the sensation, gyrating his hips in the most microscopic of circles as Joker proceeded to suck at his balls, using his tongue where he felt it necessary. The motions were careful, exploratory but extremely eager. He picked up on every twitch of Bruce's body, every breath knocked off its hinges. Watched with careful intensity as Bruce's chest would rise and decrease in size with varying speeds depending on how hard and where he was currently mouthing.

Bruce felt long fingers trace up and down the muscled contours of his thighs in a soothing fashion as the madman continued to take his heavy sac into his mouth, and the contrast of the light, liquid sensation against the savage pleasure stole a throaty moan from him, his lips beginning to form the start of the criminals name. His dick was incredibly, unimaginably hard at this point, pounding and flushed a deep purple-red, precome pooled at the top. He could feel every passing second of the ruthless agony pass like long minutes oozing into hours and the natural hum of the room began ringing in his ears, nausea threatening to close in on him, blackened spots appearing on his vision, when finally, fucking _finally, _Joker retracted his mouth from Bruce's pulsating balls and swiped at the throbbing shaft of his cock. That simple touch, the quick meeting of tongue on the core of his want had Bruce practically screaming, shouting out, not even slightly concerned about what this could be perceived as.

Joker dragged his tongue up Bruce's length, almost intimidated by the way it pounded underneath his touch, reinforcing that this was actually happening, but he kept at it, tracing patters as the billionaire hissed and cursed like a sailor. Bruce felt as the muscle reached the head of his cock, swirling around with simulated expertise, but Joker was driven by pure instinct, lapping at the organ with curious accuracy, coercing Bruce into reality-shifting pleasure. The savage mouth placed open, wet kisses along his twitching dick, sucking lightly as it moved, and then Joker started to fucking _hum,_ the sound sending electric blasts right through Bruce's body, compelling him to arch off the bed, mouth open, wailing noises escaping. He felt Joker grin against him, whether he was enjoying his torture or pleased by Bruce's euphoria was horrendously ambiguous, but then that warm mouth was engulfing his cock entirely and it ceased to matter.

Bruce's eyes wrenched open, needing to see this sight and they happened to peel just in time to see Jokers beautifully ruined mouth fully close around him, his dick disappearing past those lips until they came to rest at his pubic hair. This image, this single second of improbable reality against all odds had the pillars of his soul shaking in delirium and this path ebbing closer to humongous completion was _real. _And it was just now that it truly hit him. Joker was wrapped around him in the most intimate of ways, had taken him inside his body, connecting the two of their lives in a way that was impossible to do outside of this pulsating passage of time. The air between the two of them was ravaged and lumpy and Bruce found it hard to let it in, using every ounce of his being to focus on not thrusting into that hot perfection. And slowly, as though adapting to the wondrously new experience, Joker began to raise his head, dragging his plump lips in seamless tightness up Bruce's cock, creating a vacuum around the organ. The vigilante could feel the edges where the madman's mouth had been torn, the slight swells and ridges of the puckered scars, the indentation on his lower lip. Sustaining the tradition of the peculiar, the marred fleshed seemed to inject even more pleasure into his veins, the odd textures pumping him full of rich sensation like no other he'd experienced before now and there was no way he could stop the spindling moans now. Joker's lips slid over the slick head of his member, releasing him with a pop , his tongue spiralling over the sensitive head and without warning he was suddenly swallowed yet again, this time in a vigorously quick movement of the forest haired head bouncing up and down on his cock.

Bruce found his arms raising helplessly, drawn to Joker's hair, burying wanting fingers in the dirty green as he was pleasured by the criminal's quickly talented mouth. He bit back an exceptionally loud sound as Joker tongued him from within his mouth as he continued to impale his mouth without caution onto Bruce's dick, taking him down unfathomably deep, sending clawing ecstasy picking into his bones. He pushed Joker's curls back from where it had fallen in front of his eyes, watching with estranged awe as his greatest foe performed oral sex on him. Thinking of it so clinically could've feasibly convinced him that this was meaningless. A simple urging of his body that could be repelled in a heartbeat. But he knew it was unreachably far past that point. He didn't even truly believe it had ever even been _close_ to that point. Bodies yearning for contact was one thing, but this swam deeper. This was embedded in their souls.

Wetness prickled his stinging eyes as he breached the corners of limitless pleasure, wretchedly adoring Joker's actions, _loving _his touches with swarming, blistering emotion. Each time Joker raised his head, he caught sight of little touches of smeared artificial red imprinted along his shaft and the sight had him flinging his head back, pulling on Joker's hair, bringing that mouth closer onto him, pushing his arousal deeper into decadence. And Joker didn't miss a beat, didn't gag or make a single sound of complaint, he flowed with it effortlessly, a pleasant noise birthed in his throat. The fingers on Bruce's thighs strayed, reaching upwards as the clown shifted slightly, coming around and cupping his throbbing balls, rolling them a little in his artistic hands. And Bruce sobbed. The rippling, scraping flame snaking its way into him, rumbling in complete overbearingness had him so fucking close, just balancing one footed tightrope just on the edge. And Joker was violently attempting to push him over, head bobbing furiously, lips tightening around him, the _lightest _friction of teeth seducing him into blackness. Bruce heard the whispers of his inner voices. _Not yet._

He folded his fingers hard in Joker's hair and _pulled, _thrusting his head back with aggressive force, his cock screaming in protest as the source of its approaching climax was ripped away but he pushed the want aside with mighty insistence. Joker looked at him, not hurt, not annoyed, but with curiosity. Challenge. The most sinister of quite hisses seeped out of Bruce's swollen lips and then he was pouncing forward, pushing Joker down on the bed, lips meeting the fucking _incredible _ones of his counterpart in a kiss, awkward and sore, too much teeth, sloppy and running on empty lungs. But horrifically amazing. Bruce could taste himself on Joker's mouth, remnants of the tartness of his cock, the salty tang of his precome a little bitter on his tongue, bating the furnace inside him. He moaned into the lips that were seconds ago sending him into a wormhole of pleasure, and let them bite back at him, let them completely ravish his mouth. There was a quiet thought within his psyche that wondered if there was much he _wouldn't _let Joker, or any part of the man, do to him at this point. The plastic yes on his lips died before it had its first breath.

Joker's hands were cupping his jaw, sliding languidly into his dampened hair as their groins slotted against each other once more and Bruce decided with a loose smirk that the force of twisted nature below him was due a little reciprocation. He could, of course, choose to follow the path his enemy had taken and drag it out, torture the scarred man in brutal pleasure for long minutes, refusing to go directly to where he was needed. But if he was honest, he wasn't sure _he _could wait that long either. So in a forward fashion borrowed from the usual flourish of the man panting into his mouth, Bruce palmed Joker's cock, momentarily surprised by just how hard he was. Just how pronounced the pulsating of the organ felt in his hand. But that surprise thawed into metallic hunger as he wrapped his fist around the clown's arousal, drinking up the breathless moans he received in return for his simple action.

He began fisting the man with swift, firm strokes, any part of his brain telling him this was wrong told with venom to shut the fuck up as he tore his mouth away from Jokers and latched onto his neck, tongue tracing the bone jutting out from his shoulder. Joker's head tilted back, a little too quiet for someone like him, but when Bruce glanced up at him, his eyes were squeezed shut, lips tucked into his mouth, the paint on his face not hiding for a second the look of total, bare, human need he was wearing. And somewhere inside Bruce he was rejoicing, arrogantly pleased that _he'd _been the one to capture a creature, a _monster _like Joker in something so pure. Untainted by anarchy and order, no presence of moral coding, just pure_ feeling_. Though, he thought distantly, Joker must've felt something similar while possessing Bruce in mind and soul not a few minutes prior to this.

Joker raised his hips up to meet Bruce's thrusts, delight spreading through him as the vigilante lapped at his neck, gnawing at a particularly seductive spot. His skin was drawn into Bruce's mouth and sucked with bruising hardness, teeth still digging into him. The clown cupped back of the other's head, holding him to his body like he expected those lips alone to bring him over the edge. Bruce was captivated, entranced by these minuscule jolts he detected within the man below him, sucking at the base of his neck and watching the shivers trail through him without instruction. He felt as though he needed to indulge this moment, break the skin and luxuriate in the gall. Continuing to pump at Joker's cock, he pulled barely an inch away, reflecting on the peachy skin, watching with firm interest how it was shifting into a purple hue. He'd left plumb marks on this body so many times before. This wasn't a claiming. Wasn't a _marking. _This was ashen apology never permitted to leave his body, this was taking tradition and warping it into new. He flicked out his insatiable tongue a single time more, over the bruising flesh, and deeming his work satisfactory, he shuffled backwards, taking to his haunches below the madman.

Dizzy eyes narrowed down at him, a faint flush creeping up Joker's neck, disappearing into the paint and he could _feel _the speed of the man's breath ricocheting through his limbs. A slightly quivering hand brushed along his cheek and jaw, and he couldn't stop the wispy twitch of his lips. He'd tear into himself later that they were not _lovers, _this wasn't making love. This wasn't even _sex. _But not now. Just...not now. Bruce turned his head to the side, drawing those fingers into his mouth, rapping them in his tongue, sucking lightly, velvet thrills cascading to his stomach when Joker's eyes fluttered at his action, lips coming to form a perfect 'O'.

Releasing the digits, he pressed a kiss to the head of the madman's cock, his hand still working at the base, soaking up the way Joker's body buzzed at the act, his fingers twitching in the air like he didn't know what to do with himself. Like he didn't know how to react. Arousal was howling in his synapses and he had to fiercely command his hips not to jut out and rub against to cool sheets to earn a sliver of friction, what he so desperately wanted, but he was nowhere near done with this yet. Bruce rolled his tongue out onto Joker's dick, coiling it down, tracing veins and chasing moans as he worked the flesh, the wet muscles writhing against the larger organs, taking in into his mouth and releasing it. Never resting on a single technique. Sure to lash Joker deeper into madness. This...type of sex, swallowing the centre of another man's arousal wasn't completely foreign to Bruce, but it had been many solemn nights since the feigned carefree days of his early adulthood. But having Joker now, silently pleading and pulsing inside his lips was nettling his heart, pinpricking his desires and why on earth had he even given this brand of gratifying another up? But of course the devils in the thundering shells within him hissed that this wasn't about _types._ This was about _this _person. And it was with hatred he acknowledged the truth. Though, tarnished acceptance didn't flutter with hate for the man...but, curiously, the situation.

He felt Joker slam his hips forwards, nearly choking Bruce and the playboy berated himself mentally. This wasn't a time for internal debate. He swallowed down pooling saliva and took a breath, shooing away the reflexes threatening his efficiency and dove back in, this time taking the throbbing penis deep inside his mouth, his unneeded hands tracing patterns over Joker's stomach, occasionally tickling against his thudding balls much to the green haired-man's approval if the renewed moaning was anything to go by. His eyes found themselves closed, enjoying the task entirely too much for someone who was not receiving any direct stimulation at the action, but just having this man, taking him inside, it soothed the flaring sparks inside him, leaving him almost languid in his actions, affection oozing out of his pours as he boiled pleasure inside Joker. He allowed this to continue for a few more seconds before reciting in his head they had further levels to reach before this...whatever it was melted back into the iced talons of normalcy once more and he let the clown's wet cock fall from his lips, watching it twitch, level against the man's flat belly.

Joker's hissed curses swarmed in the air, knees curling upwards as his ass rose from the bed, thrusting into nothing. Bruce felt his pulse boom, lost inside him at the sight, festering lust licking at his innards and he slid deeper between Joker's legs, teetering on realms of the tender most intimacy as he knocked the muscled thighs further apart, hands sliding down to cup at Joker's ass cheeks. He let his breath brush over Joker's lower regions with thunder soft touch, drinking in the mess of a man he'd shaped, not able to really make out his face, but sensing abhorrent pleasure curdling around him. Giving in to the cries filling the room as well as the part of him that wanting to connect with his enemy in such a depraved manner, his lips feathered just inside the crease of Joker's ass, the melody of ceasing breath seizing latent parts of him. He dragged his bottom lips with a suspended determined laze up to Joker's perineum, swiping his tongue at the smooth expanse of skin, a startled groan leaving a heaving chest somewhere above him. With dark eyes, he tenderly spread the soft globes of flesh he was faintly beginning to admire and descended, tongue twirling against the skin, seeping further and further downwards until it came to rest at his entrance, not hesitating as it began its assault.

"_Oh" _The single huskily strained word, barely more than a vowel had Bruce's nostrils' flaring, waves of callous yearning javelined into him and he moved with a little more insistence running in his veins, a little more of him wanting to please. Just for this moment...to not send this man into bouts of pain and call up illicit, horrendous laughter, but just to bathe him in his mirrored want. To let the snarls subside and flow with the clouded whispers glossing over his consciousness. He flicked his tongue at Joker's tight entrance, his hands coming up to rest at the swaying hips, quelling the helpless movement as he lapped deftly at the ring of muscle, intent on coaxing deafening screams out of the criminal. He circled the flesh with his moist, hot tongue, massaging with the tip and rolling it slightly with a double-jointed ability that had Joker biting into his lightning knuckles, muffling the harmony of grunts and sighed groans. That wouldn't do.

Adjusting his angle a touch, his head leaning to the side to gain better access, he opened Joker's cheeks a little wider. Bruce languidly licked at the heat between them with invigorated intensity, prodding and thrusting against the resistance with his mouth, feeling the muscles flex under the twisting path of his attentions. The same long, excruciating heat that he'd used to tease the clown's cock was fully in submerged in the task of snaking and curling around his hole, opening him up in ruthless, relaxed, untold rhythms. Joker felt as though he was some hell beast, sent to fork him into glassy madness, pushing him closer and closer and not relenting. Not for a moment. The criminal closed his eyes tighter, the skin on his fingers breaking where he was scissoring into it with gnawing teeth as Bruce continued to twist that tongue against him, missioned with melting him down.

A hand strayed from his hip and brushed up to grab his wrist, fingers curling around him, tugging gently. Bruce wanted to hear him. Joker slit his eyes and cast his gaze down at the man between his thighs and let his fist be guided away, just as Bruce rewarded him with a quick stroke of his pounding arousal. The garrotted wail it tore from him was heart rendering, and it was as though some kind of phantom dedicated to nothing but pleasure had incised its way into the two men. Joker's fingers clawed at the sheets, tensing his entire body while doing his utmost to relax his ass and Bruce slowly twirled his tongue and probed in a way that had the wet muscle seeping into him, moving in and out, satirical of what they both needed to follow. It was as though a dam had cracked open and the clown was on the crust of infinity, drowning under thick currents of bliss as his Bat continued to lavish him in this wonderful treatment, licking at his insides. He spasmed and shook with frightening seizure-like quakes, but Bruce just carried on, like he was expecting it, letting him ride it all out but not letting him slip over.

Another prickling, soothing stroke followed as the tongue withdrew from inside him, just resolving to stay where it was for a moment, fluttering against his entrance as Bruce slowly, _barely _caressed his cock. Lips pressed against the delicate flesh, lingering just to kiss him, and if Joker's mind was his own right now, the quips he could've come up with were endless. But then Bruce's mouth was clambering back up, licking around his sac, trailing up his cock. Evil and wanting, rarely giving. This punishment was five year under electric shock treatment at Arkham threaded with the most delicious rain flavoured of chaos and if Bruce dreamed of stopping, reaping terror was more than inevitable. But Bruce wasn't stopping, he climbed and climbed until he was straddling over Joker again, smiling to himself as the clown in his half mad state sought out his lips, eyes closed and heart like a hummingbird. He obliged for a few minutes before pulling away and staring down at him, nothing left in his furnace eyes but lust.

"Is there any...?" Bruce's voice was hoarse and strained, the low rumble trailing off before his words blossomed. The clown in his flustered disorientation frowned up at him, the question hardly registering in his pleasure saturated brain at all but then Bruce's fingers brushed at his entrance again and the gasp he croaked out hammered down the meaning to him, nailing it right into his skull and he blinked up at his greatest foe, his only lover, his only everything and swallowed. There were dangerous sparks in his spine, coiling around in his bones like they held plans of ripping them from his meat and they rooted from the soaring, piercing look Bruce was giving him. His dusky green orbs flicked down to Bruce's naked body a heartbeat and saw the quivering skin, the uncontrollable shaking of his limbs and knew his want was matched with no question here. And when his eyes homed back in on the brunet, he _felt _the resulting waver. The silence brimmed with panting lasted a daring second and then he was shrugging, as though it never happened.

"I don't know," he murmured, shaking off the way his misused voice faltered over the words. He swallowed down the thickness on his tongue. "Try the drawers." The sudden introduction of cool air as Bruce moved away was discomforting and just for a slimy, vile second he was an hour ago, without knowing this completion fully. He didn't like it. He watched with demanding eyes as the playboy flustered about the room, yanking open drawers and rustling through them with an eagerness that with any other person may be a little embarrassing. But this was nastily mutual. A product of sadistic fates. And it wasn't just he who felt the soaring of something internal when Bruce's hand finally rested on an appropriate bottle, large sighs meandering in the quietness as he did so.

Gingerly, Bruce came back to the bed, the desired object in hand, and knelt on the mattress, eyes skipping along the covers until they came to rest on Joker's. The clown's hands shot through the air and grabbed the billionaire by his dark hair, yanking him off balance and towards him as their mouths collided, raw and wanting as they hovered over what had been waiting to crown for years. Without moving his lips away, Bruce settled between Joker's legs, feeling like some wild carnivore and at the same time, like something wistful and mended by peace. He flicked open the cap of the clear container, his heart wiggling about in his chest as he pressed down, feeling the thick liquid seep out onto his fingers, coating them thoroughly in the solution, determined to make this feel at the very least _good _for the other. There was a murmuring in his brain chanting this wasn't a battle field, overruling that still looming other side of him. But he was licking at the inside of the clown's mouth, moaning without bounds as the other took to sucking lightly on his tongue and it occurred to him that those pugnacious other sides couldn't _dream_ of stopping this.

Once his fingers were sufficiently lubricated, he trailed them down to the now thoroughly moist area between Joker's legs, bypassing the tremendously painful looking appendage in between and resting at his entrance. With a pertinacious stream of courage corkscrewing into him, he found his fingers pushing against the ring of muscle, rubbing in small circles until the barrier relaxed enough to fit the tip of one digit in. Joker's sudden intake of breath had him pausing a moment, shattering the compulsion to just get this over and done with and he carefully pressed his mouth against the madman's cheek, listening to the thudding of his heart. After a five pulses, he slipped his finger a little deeper, faintly surprised at the lack of resistance. The clown let his head fall right back against the pillow, mouth hanging open as he voiced his approval at the action. This...wasn't terrible.

Bruce began to slowly plunge his middle finger in and out of the tight opening, twisting as he went along, mimicking the next step they would take together. Unable to reach the other's mouth at this angle, he latched his teeth onto an erect nipple, enjoying the surprised yelp that bit into the quiet. He crooked his finger up a little, rubbing at the internal walls and looking up intently at the spasms he could see in Joker's neck, the sighs emerging from that ruby mouth and found himself needing more. Releasing the reddened nipple, he looked downward, seeking out the bottle of lubrication before squeezing a little more onto his fingers and nudging in an extra one. This time, he gave no waiting time, no warning and slowly slid them into Joker's incredibly hot ass, eventually scissoring them a little, stretching the man open. He felt the legs at either side of him shake under his attentions and knew without a moment's deliberation that he was uncoiling something inside the maniac, dragging him down into the filthy pits of climax and the haze in his head healed, just like that. And then there was nothing else.

He crooked his fingers upwards, aiming for that spot he'd experienced first hand in his private quarters many times himself and it was only after a couple of minutes lead by loud gasping and persistent rubbing that a broken cry alerted him to its location. He lightly pressed the pads of his fingers against the raised area, pushing up gently, knowing it only took the most tender of touches. Anything more was far, far too much. The result was a spine twisting, skin rippling, all-body heaving quaver, trembles rushing through the sinewy form and Bruce felt the heat below burn with vehement passion, precome sticky against his belly and his blood demanded that this was hurried. He couldn't deny these impulses for much longer, _wouldn't. _

Joker was babbling incoherently, repeating words and his name like he was some heated lover Bruce had romanced for years, but he couldn't find the need to be perturbed by this, he just continued to thrust his slick fingers in and out of the tight passageway, feeling the muscles clamp down on him, groaning as he imagined how it would feel around his erection. He was mindlessly pouring quick kisses all over the other man's torso as he added another finger, slipping it in with ease, opening the digits against the constricting walls, making sure Joker was entirely prepared for what would follow. He could barely hear for the echo of his own blood in his ears and at the same time he could hear every last breathy sound the clown made with precise definition.

He stilled his fingers inside the other man, his other hand somehow having started caressing the flexing stomach and Joker's blazed eyes cut open and he couldn't help the softness in his expression as he looked down at the madman. Still panting, Joker's lips twitched up, not forming their intended smirk but resting lightly on the pleasant, crooked smile that was hanging there instead and Bruce returned it, suspending pretence. He withdrew his fingers, earning him a wince and a delicious sound of protest but then Joker clapped hungry eyes on the vigilante as those strong hands spread thick lubricant over his burgeoning arousal, his eyes fluttering at the stimulation his cock was craving and twitchy fingers found themselves clawing at the air as Joker reached for Bruce, tugging on his arms to bring him over his body. Bruce met his gaze, a breath of Batman flaring in his pupils as he spread Joker's legs open a little further, nestling down in the space between.

Neither of them could grasp against the reality they were in, what was seconds away from happening but they understood that this _had _to happen, their want drowned by need, needing to be connected in the most base of terms. Bruce realised somewhere amidst the hammering inside his skull that it could just as easily be him about to take Joker into his own body, realised he wanted that just as equally as he wanted this and it only served to cauterise deeper arousal into his blood flow. He positioned himself at Joker's entrance, staring down at the man below him for five seconds, ten, and then he was slowly pushing in, hands gripping the clown's sides, holding his breath as he watched himself gradually disappear into the tightness. Joker's eyes flinched a little, not reacting fully to the obvious pain, but instead adopting a shine that told of his complete trust in this situation, He felt himself slowly ripping open, and it was awkward and sore but it was washed with nothing he could have ever dreamed. The way it felt- Bruce's cock sinking into him, stretching him open with something akin to care, joining their bodies as their souls vined out to do the same. It was like lava sizzling at his flesh.

Bruce could feel the second that the clown gave into the sensations, the muscles relaxing just enough for him to fully slip himself into Joker, until he was buried to the hilt. They panted like they were on a moonlight chase and maybe they were, somehow still pursuing their roles. Chasing destiny. He couldn't stop staring down at the other man and oh god, it was so hot, too tight, too perfect around Bruce, like the hangman's noose was slipping around his neck and he was given a prayer and last word to chew. And then he was pulling out, sharp and swift, groans torn out from each man as Joker tightened around him and legs laced around his waist and with one final glance at his life, he plunged forward and the rope snapped around his neck.

Joker arched off the covers, eyes bulging and tantalising moans falling from his lips and every cell in Bruce's body hummed in frenzied appreciation at the sight, heat unravelling at the base of his spine, splintering upwards. He began thrusting his hips forwards at an even pace, sinking deeper into Joker's ass, marveling at just how inexplicably well fit they were, how easily they had slot together. Joker was gripping him from the inside, his limbs snaking around Bruce's back and drawing him nearer like he was hell bent on soaking every last part of Bruce up and if this man was an acid Bruce wasn't sure he'd fight him off even as his skin leaked off his bones. He was trying to go slow, ignoring the way his legs felt like butter as he strained against his urge to pound into the warmth around him in abandon, but he had an inkling the other wasn't used to this sort of act and tried desperately to keep his movements as painless as possible. But the legs wrapped around his ass were urging him onward, pulling his cock further inside, fingers digging into him wherever they scrambled but with inhuman strength and harsh breathes he remained moving with caution.

A startling, frustrated grunt left the madman's lips and he began bucking up against Bruce's thrusts, setting a much faster, harder pace, sighing as he felt that thick cock slip into him again and again. Bruce grit his teeth at the sudden change and perched himself on two extended arms and shed his caution as he began to thoroughly plough into the clown's ass. Joker absolutely _screamed _when the Bat let go, slamming his cock into his opening, hips snapping forward, impossible to stop. He scratched up Bruce's back, skin flaking off under his nails, winding red tendrils in their wake, until his hands reached the billionaire's damp neck and he yanked him down, their mouths pressing flush together as their bodies continued to do the same.

Bruce tried to moan into Joker's mouth, tried to voice the way his emotions were clashing like thunder clouds but there wasn't enough air, there wasn't enough to _breath. _He felt like it was sweltering, like he was baking himself alive and there was nothing but this man, this horrendous flaw on the face of the earth, nothing left but to hold on, to burn together. The brunet shifted a little on the bed, angling his thrusts with intent of injecting Joker with immense pleasure and as he jolted forwards, a half choked, muffled wail expelled itself from sinful lips letting Bruce know that he'd don't just that. The other man released Bruce's lips to bury his face in his neck, biting down against the liquefying ecstasy rooting in his lower stomach.

It was like the skies were ready to explode, come apart and flutter to the earth in all consuming supernovas, as if the rest of the world took in a collective breath of anticipation as those of worth were suspended in a tumultuous union, basking in the grey. Bruce felt Joker shudder around him as with each thrust the billionaire's stomach grazed along his neglected arousal, tattooing his veins in electric, forcing him to throw his head back once more and then the painted face came back into Bruce's sight. His brow was furrowed, his lips parted slightly and his eyes were unwavering from the other man's. And there was something fidgeting amongst the conflicting shades of green, something that looked a lot like completion, a lot like freedom. It sent Bruce plummeting to a deeper level of pleasure, icing his charcoaled remains, hysterically screaming out at him to take that plunge with it. Bruce swallowed back a sob, his expression tightening as he plunged into the lither man, craving that same feeling that was baptising Joker's face.

But it wasn't enough. Seeing the way Joker writhed around underneath hip, clawed against him, invited him in, like he was filling up cracks in a grimy wall, it made Bruce _need_ the same thing. He thrust harder, placed firefly kisses along every inch of flesh in reach, tried to quieten it down but he wanted that ultimate. He'd come this far, let all the bonds drop from his skin as he swallowed the fiery sword, he wasn't leaving without finishing this.

A momentary flash of panic bubbled on Joker's face as Bruce withdrew his cock from him, breath shaky, vision bitty. He felt horridly, sordidly denied, empty. The thoughts that _this couldn't be it _avalanched inside the clown's head and he was on the verge of launching into an attack, frothing and biting at anything he could for Bruce daring to mess with him like this, but then Bruce was reaching for the discarded bottle of lube, squeezing a globule out onto his fingers, avoiding Joker's gaze as he coated them in the liquid. Joker panted, his sight finally dawning into focus as he watched the billionaire place the bottle down and reach behind him.

"_Oh", _Joker breathed, the barest flicker of a smile shadowing his face for a pulse before he was pulled back under the throws of the putrid, flagitious fervour that was dominating him. Bruce prepared himself with adept fingers and great proficiency, having done this to himself and to others many times before, but not wasting any time on lingering enough in the right spots to melt into pleasure, but continued to stretch himself open as quickly as possible, knowing they were both lavished with suffering under this impromptu recess. When he was able to slide a second finger in and out of himself with ease, groaning pleasantly at the sparking sensations, he amended this would have to do and pulled back his hand and finally met with the other man's gaze once again.

Unconsciously, Joker's tongue swiped out at his lip but whether this was due to habit or lust was debatable. Bruce crawled over to the man and straddled his legs without pause, both men moaning helplessly as their cocks brushed, mocking their states as they stood tinkering on the edge, almost anything possessing the ability to send them over.

Taking a deep breath, Bruce raised himself on his knees over the clown and gripped the base of his cock, the other shaking heavily under his touch and positioned it at his slick entrance. He gripped Joker's hip with his other hand to steady himself, the heat radiating from the tanned skin immense, and slowly lowered himself onto his..._lover's _arousal.

"_Fuck" _he panted as the hot, pulsating flesh filled him, spasmodic embers dancing into an inferno in his spine and this is what he had been craving, this sensation of sinking down into the final stages of inky depravity. It was like liquid life. When Joker was fully sheathed within him, he leant forward slightly, adjusting the angle to his liking and stole the opportunity to swipe a kiss from gasping lips. Joker's hands slid up and down his back like he didn't know what to do with them, but the other's lips removed all traces of confusion, eliminating it before it had chance to germinate and he rested his broad hands on Bruce's hips.

"Bats" he whispered against Bruce's sore lips, the name like honeyed reverence, devotion seeping through the fissures in his voice. It made something inside the vigilante throb, made him almost _hurt. _And he replied in the only manner possible in the world they were caught in, in this second, and forced his lips tighter against Joker's, passion like they hadn't yet experienced bleeding with emotions the elite had yet to define. Without removing his tongue from Joker's mouth, he began rocking his hips, pulling himself up a touch and then sinking back down, his erection twitching with each thrust. He could barely remember the outside world, the roles and duties and morals and _sides. _It was like it had become unhinged, a pocket universe containing only them and this frantic coupling they were locked in.

His breath grew louder, his vision blurrier and he let Joker's mouth go, reared backwards, teeth bared and let out a rabid roar, unleashing everything. This was more than anything in existence. More than Batman and Joker. More than Gordon, than Alfred, than Rachel. This was waxing elements forging together, too close to limbo and the only thing grounding him was the feel of the hands roaming his body, clutching blindly onto him like the other man was attempting the same. Joker began to thrust up into him and the sound of their bodies slapping together burrowed into each man, slipping them an onslaught of brilliant sensation, feeling it stop fluttering inside them and start shredding them apart. The air was sultry and smelt of sweat and sex and the heat was almost intolerable but Joker was so perfect beneath him, inside him and he just wanted more of this, could stay like this forever, rotting inside a living shell. Decomposing into being.

With his eyes trapped shut and his mouth leaking expletives, he blindly reached for his cock, the instantaneous thrill slashing through him fraying him into oblivion. Every last nerve in his body was sizzling, alive with undeniable vehemence and he was floating without hold right into the path of the acidic light desperate to take him, finding himself flowing to it without protest. His body tightened as impending release spiralled in his groin and he slammed himself down onto Joker's cock, impaling himself with hunger and yelping out each time the heat inside him hit him _right _on his prostate as he pumped his dick, needing just a _little _more to climax. And it didn't surprise him when Joker's fist batted away his own, seizing the task for himself as he stroked Bruce's dick with a firm hand, his motions quick and sloppy as they clambered towards orgasm, but Bruce didn't seem to notice. He was leaning back, fists buried in the sheets and positively engulfed in the pleasure they were both inflicting on each other, nothing but a handful of dust particles separating them after years of solace.

Joker felt Bruce's ass squeeze down on him hard and quivering before rhapsody bled into the room, swallowing his vision, pleasure tearing him to pieces. And then there were lips on his once more as they drank in each other's scream, the room becoming bleached as chalky pressure boiled over, implanting them with sweet rapture, the universe detonating around them as something burst within. Bruce felt himself coming over Joker's hands and stomach, wildly flailing and squirming as delirium etched into his bones and he was blanketed in this sugared culmination. His body felt like it was crumbling, dissolving completely, like he was ethereal. Pure fucking ecstasy. His throat protested under the strength of the noise breaking out of his lips, but pleasure waves pushed through him and fighting was not an option. He felt warm liquid spill into him and his body doubled over in a delicious after shock as Joker tucked his head against Bruce's throbbing chest and moaned into the hot flesh, lips lingering there as he rode his way through to a ravished, barren Nirvana.

His orgasm still tingling about his flesh and his mind washed with a pleasant glow, Bruce slumped forward, exhausted and utterly drained, Joker collapsing under him. He was panting into Joker's firm chest, the madman's fingers running through his hair with fumbling skill, telling him the clown was no means approaching coherency yet. He threw his body to the side before he even thought about sinking into the bliss of post-climax mist, knowing he'd crush the other man if he stayed where he was. Collapsing into the bedspread at the side of the criminal, he scrambled blindly for the other's hand, not wanting to open his eyes and see the ferocious demons coming to claim him in reality and focused instead on ingraining the acme he'd discovered into his brain, burrowing closer to the heat of the still-convulsing body next to his.

He gripped the man's hand tight, stroking his thumb along the ridges in the worn fingers, pressing his lips lightly against the expanse of flesh of his upper arm and sighed as Joker turned on his side, body curling around Bruce's, slotting together with impeccable simplicity. They were glued in ambrosial inertia, silently delighted, intoxicated on jubilant ripples of lethargy as their limbs slid comfortably together. Bruce looked to the window. Sallow, etiolated light was creeping in, sliming shadows across the floor. A breathy giggle wormed its way through the silence, letting them both know they had to be leaving soon, that this balance was quickly failing them under the commands of the fates. But for now, for the few breaths before the sun rose behind dull clouds, they were contented to hang.

Limp, lifeless and alive.

* * *

**A/N: WOW. So...that was a _little _longer than intended. o_o God, this was supposed to be a series of _drabbles_ originally and now I'm puking out ridic long chapters. D: And this was like literally ALL porn. I've never written that much porn before in my life! The sex scene itself is literally over 9000. My fic is the bastard child of an old internet meme. D; Oh dear god. Since it's so long, there are bound to be mistakes that I haven't spotted, even though I've reread it a few times, so if you catch anything embarassing, could you let me know?  
**

**Points if you spotted the Inception references. :P I couldn't ****_not _****include a couple, man, I'm obsessed. xD But if this ****_was _****Inception, you just know that they'd be each other's totems. It's ****just fate, dude. **

**The style of this chapter is a little different from that of previous chapters, but that's because I couldn't write straight up porn in that sort of narrative. Saaahrrry.  
**

**Anyway, if you haven't fallen asleep, hope you liked it and it'll be, ah, ****_interesting _****to see what you made of that. xD**


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